Blog Initiation 11/6/14

In his article "Plagiarism and Promiscuity, Authors and Plagiarism," Russel Wiebe discusses the complex issue of defining plagiarism, in a variety of different contexts. He begins by providing an anecdote about how to students, cheating is considered a relatively normal thing. He says, "students seem to think that cheating is so much the norm that admitting it hardly needs cover." Cheating in school is seen as a semi-acceptable practice due to the widespread understanding that school, at its very core is not really real. Cheating on a paper in school will directly affect nobody but the student herself, therefore doing so is seen as less serious in context. However, as Wiebe discusses, this is not the case with certain professionals, whose integrity and honestly in their credentials can affect those around them. "The airline pilot who cheated to get his pilot’s license or the surgeon doing “your mother’s surgery” who cheated his or her way through medical school usually elicits a response that

differentiates those activities, which are real and therefore have consequences, from school tasks, which are largely “unreal” and therefore, outside the realm of ethical consideration” (Wiebe, 29) 

The internet has inarguably played a role in the ease of plagiarism. The Internet allows users to cheat more effectively and discreetly than in times prior, and as Rebecca Moore Howard wrote in The Chronicle Review, “if you are a professor in the United States and you have a pulse, you have heard about the problem of Internet plagiarism." Wiebe provides a definition of Plagiarism as defined by the website "Plagiarism Stoppers," which calls the practice "a rapidly growing problem in many venues today" which "needs to be addressed by all who are in the education field by teaching the observance of proper citation compliance AND by making sure students know that stealing somebody's work is wrong." Wiebe references the work of Moore Howard, who believes that there are three main forms of plagiarism- cheating, non-attribution, and patchwork. 

Despite being likely very against plagiarism, Howard does note that it is impossible to create something in this day and age that is completely original. Everything is inspired by something else, that is the very nature and the vast importance of citing one's sources in every academic context. While one's work is more than likely a combination of different sources mixed in with (hopefully) one's own perspective, it is vital that sources are cited so each person's work may be respected and maintained. Wiebe quotes more agains saying "in academic writing, at least, there is no simple "originality," no such work that simply jumps from the student's mind to the page in some unmediated way." 

Wiebe goes onto cite Brian Martin, who offers a second perspective into the specific types of plagiarism. Theres the most obvious plagiarism, which occurs when one steals the exact words of another person without using quotation marks or citing him or her in any context. Wiebe says that this would be called "word for word plagiarism." Then there is the slightly less gruesome "paraphrasing plagiarism," which occurs when one references something, but never really looks anything up or gives any real credit to the source they're using. Martin's third, and "more elusive" type of plagiarism is when an author uses the structure of an argument without providing credit. Finally, there's "plagiarism of authorship" which Wiebe defines as "the blunt case of putting one's name to someone else's work." This is perhaps the most severe and gross form of plagiarism. 

Of course, everything is grey in this world and there are in fact some forms of acceptable plagiarism in the real world. These are what Martin refers to as "institutionalized plagiarisms." Instances where a politician, movie star, business executive, etc. may have a subordinate write a speech, which he or she delivers and never pays authorship credit to the

actual composer. This kind of plagiarism occurs it what is in essence, a hierarchal of plagiaristic definition. The higher up one is, the less likely it is to be condemned, or even acknowledged at all of plagiarizing something. Martin provides some examples to this hierarchy. "When a student steals another students work, that's plagiarism. When an academic borrows another teacher's materials to produce a class lecture without citation, that's scholarship. When a supervisor takes credit for an underling's work, that's business." There certainly is a blurred acceptance of what does and doesn't qualify as plagiarism. Wiebe yet again references Martin, whose taxonomy argues that where one resides in a power structure holds just as much overall relevance as whether or not the person actually plagiarized something.




Sources:

Wiebe, Russel. "Plagiarism and Promiscuity, Authors and Plagiarism." (n.d.): 29-47. Web.