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Information Literacy Tutorial: B. Plagiarism

A module-based information literacy tutorial that addresses each stage of the research process, including selecting a topic, identifying information needs, selecting sources, locating information, evaluating information, and citing sources.

What is Plagiarism?

 

Plagiarism in plain English:

  • Using someone else’s work in your own academic work without giving proper credit.    

Intentional plagiarism:

  • Copying a friend’s or classmate’s work
  • Buying or borrowing papers
  • Cutting and pasting blocks of text without providing documentation of the original source
  • Borrowing images and other media without documentation of the original source
  • Publishing work on the Web without the permission of the creator

Unintentional plagiarism:

  • Careless paraphrasing
  • Poor documentation of sources
  • Quoting excessively
  • Failure to use your own ideas or words

UWC Policy

The UWC policy with regard to plagiarism - University Calendar, Rule A.5.1.8

  • Academic Dishonesty reads "Academic dishonesty is a serious misconduct and will be dealt with in terms of the provisions of the University's Disciplinary Rules for Students. 
  • Academic Dishonesty is not limited to plagiarism, cheating, collusion, but extends to all deceptions relating to academic work"
  • The Software programme called "TurnItIn" is another strategy used by UWC to engage students in understanding how copying texts written by others is cheating.

Check your understanding

 

Please work through the following quiz:

 

Interactive Quiz

 

  Continue  

In-text Referencing

1.     Paraphrasing (writing the ideas in your own words)


Harvard Style:
The sentence starts with the surname of the author followed by the date and page reference in round brackets. 

 Example:
Anderson (1987:73-74) advances three arguments against the death penalty. He contends that the death penalty is inhuman and no society that purports to be civilized can condone it. It has never been proved that the death penalty acts as a deterrent, and, furthermore, many innocent people have died in vain for the crimes committed by others....

APA Style
Note the punctuation is different: the date is followed by a comma and the pages are preceded by p. (1987, p.73-74.)

Example:
Anderson (1987:p.73-74) advances three arguments against the death penalty. He contends that the death penalty is inhuman and no society that purports to be civilized can condone it. It has never been proved that the death penalty acts as a deterrent, and, furthermore, many innocent people have died in vain for the crimes committed by others....


 

2.     Quoting (writing the exact words of the author)

Harvard Style
The sentence ends with the surname of the author, the date of the publication and the page references in round brackets.

 Example:
"My arguments against the death penalty are three-fold. To do away with any human being is uncivilised and inhuman. There is no proof that the death penalty acts as a deterrent to heinous criminal acts... and it's a documented fact that many innocent men and women have been wrongly sentenced for the crimes of others" (Anderson, 1987:73-74)

APA Style
APA style is different: the date is followed by a comma and the pages are preceded by p.

Example:
"My arguments against the death penalty are three-fold. To do away with any human being is uncivilised and inhuman. There is no proof that the death penalty acts as a deterrent to heinous criminal acts... and it's a documented fact that many innocent men and women have been wrongly sentenced for the crimes of others" (Anderson, 1987, p.73-74)

 

Source: http://www.ufh.ac.za/library/InfoLit/ref4.html

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