Define plagiarism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Define plagiarism - Essay Example Instead of working hard in the library by reading books, or taking notes, one may get tempted to just search the Internet and copy information verbatim. This ‘cut and paste’ culture is to be condemned. Plagiarism can indeed be considered as "theft of intellectual property† because just like how the theft of physical property is an offence, borrowing a person’s work without acknowledgment is like theft. After all, a lot of mental effort and time would have gone into the original work. The least one can do is to properly acknowledge it. 1. Deliberate plagiarism is deliberately using another person’s work without any credit to the original work. It includes ‘cut and paste’ directly from a source, paying someone else to write the assignment etc (Study & Learning Centre, 2005). Deliberate plagiarism can be avoided by planning well ahead of the assignment, meticulously noting the sources, making rough drafts, having a proper communication with the tutor (Lehigh University, 2006), and avoiding the temptation of using another writer etc. 2. A citation is required whenever an â€Å"idea, quote (written or spoken), data, image or other content that is not yours unless it is common knowledge† (The Pennsylvania State University, 2007) is used. 3. If exact words or phrases are used, then they must be used within quotations. Only essential words or phrases must be quoted; entire paragraphs need not be quoted. The authors name must be mentioned in the quoted sentence (Stolley,