Plagiarism Guidelines
Plagiarism defined: (Susquehanna University) according to the American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, plagiarism means to “steal and use the ideas or writings of another as one’s own,” whether it is intentional or unintentional. Incidences of plagiarism will be reported to the Director of Academic Studies and will be kept on file. You are plagiarizing if you do the following:
- Incomplete paraphrasing: If you use substantive words, phrases, or rhetorical structures from your source without documentation, you are plagiarizing. Whether you ‘kidnap’ one or two words, or a whole page, you are plagiarizing.
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Missing citation: If you use any ideas that are clearly not common knowledge without citing your source, you are plagiarizing. It does not matter whether you’ve expressed the ideas in your own language.
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Copying: If you simply copy from any source without quotation marks or attributions you are plagiarizing.
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Among the practices which constitute plagiarisms are: using in their entirety or even in part recycled papers or papers from another course or teacher or papers written by someone else, either by a student or a person publishing a paper in an academic journal, book, or via the internet.
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To avoid plagiarism, you must cite all quotations, summaries, and paraphrases and summaries in your own words.
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Quotations must be copied accurately, word for word, and they must be placed in quotation marks unless they have been sent off from the text.
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The best way to avoid plagiarism is to be extremely careful and scrupulous. When in doubt cite, and cite correctly. Ask this question: without the words and ideas of someone else would you have been able to write the paper the way you did. If the answer is no, then you must cite and cite correctly. Always take great pains to attribute sources and to acknowledge debts to others. If ever in doubt, consult your teacher.
