Plagiarism
As part of academic writing you will be expected to read around the subject you are studying and use books and journal articles, etc. However, you need to be careful that when you write up your essays you do not plagiarise other people’s work.
What is plagiarism?
Some examples of plagiarism:
- copying someone else's work and submitting it as your own
- copying words or ideas from others work without proper referencing
- copying whole sentences, paragraphs from others work without referencing correctly
- copying large quantities from others work with correct referencing is still plagiarism
- changing the word order of a sentence composed by someone else without acknowledging you have done this in your references
- cutting and pasting web pages into your assignment
- giving incorrect information about the source of a quotation
So, can I refer to others work provided I acknowledge it?
Yes. It is
Do I really need to follow all these rules?
Yes, you certainly do. Plagiarism is seen as academic misconduct, and carries penalties. You can find details in the University's policy document Academic Misconduct Procedure [pdf].
Can Turnitin help me?
The University has a software tool called Turnitin to help you check whether you have accidently plagiarised. Visit our e-Submission, grades and feedback web pages for more information.
See also How to reference.