I trust this won't simply appear pedantic but I think that 
there is an important definition at stake here.  I would 
argue that plagiarism does not require an intent to deceive 
- if the work appears to pass the work of others off as your 
own, then it is plagiarism.  Hence, when Peter Levin says:

"a beautiful example of how a simple error in setting up a 
document can lead to the writer being accused of plagiarism",

I think that should actually read:

"a beautiful example of how a simple error in setting up a 
document can lead to the writer committing plagiarism".

Clearly this error was not as heinous a breach as if Levin 
had omitted all references from that paragraph altogether. 
But, without checking the reference, it was impossible to 
tell what part of the text was not Levin's own work - was he 
acknowledging a similar idea in the reference to those he 
expressed in the paragraph?  Was it that he had quoted the 
final sentence of the paragraph?  Was it, as turned out to 
be the case, that he had quoted the whole paragraph?  Or, 
had this occurred in a piece of work that did not have a 
quote immediately preceding it, did this mean that actually 
the previous several pages was a direct quote?

And, before I am accused me of exaggerating for the sake of 
the argument, I have been in exactly this last situation 
with a student over their final year synoptic dissertation - 
they had copied large chunks of it verbatim and claimed 
that, as they had put an endnote flag at the end of each 
multi-page lift, they had not done anything wrong.  Unlike 
Levin, their submission was not due to a error in their 
layout but in their understanding.  But, if we had detected 
them doing this, even by error, in their first or second 
years, we would have been able to save them from the far 
worse difficulties they found themselves in at that late 
stage in their course.

There is also a deeper issue (for those of us who believe 
that passing off others work as our own is wrong).  It is 
very difficult to prove that someone intended to cheat when 
they are found to have submitted the work of others as their 
own, given the endless list of possible excuses about not 
understanding what plagiarism is, or not understanding how 
to paraphrase without plagiarising, or not understanding how 
to reference properly, or not understanding how to take 
notes and then use them without subsequently plagiarising, 
etc, etc all compounded by the personal difficulties the 
student was going through at the time, or the time pressures 
caused by a clash of deadlines or by the need to work to pay 
the tuition fees, or the friend who typed up the essay but 
didn't understand about footnotes or who missed out some of 
the references, or the strange computer programme that 
destroyed all the careful layout indicating quotes, etc, etc 
(some few of which may even be, in the case of some 
students, at least partly true).  If we do not take all 
plagiarism seriously, whether or not we can safely conclude 
that it was deliberate, and impose penalties for it based 
primarily on the extent of the plagiarism, it is almost 
impossible to penalise most cases of deliberate cheating and 
that is an offence against those students who do submit 
their own work, who expect others to do likewise and who 
expect the University to detect and punish those who do not.

Jon Appleton
Oxford Brookes

[log in to unmask] wrote:

>  
> I am indebted to Jon Appleton for a beautiful example of how a simple error in setting up a document can lead to the writer being accused of plagiarism. The paragraph to which he refers in the extract below, which is at the foot of page 3 of my paper, should have been indented. By an error on my part (now corrected), it wasn't. Just as well that I'm not a student at Brookes, where - even though that paragraph was properly footnoted - 'we are clear that this would be regarded as plagiarism'!
>  
> Just possibly a slight excess of zeal here?
>  
> Peter Levin
>  
> ________________________________
> 
> From: Plagiarism on behalf of Jon Appleton
> Sent: Mon 05/06/2006 14:14
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: Re: Plagiarism in context
> 
>  
> Jon Appleton wrote: ...
> 
> I was also intrigued by Levin's fifth reference (at the foot
> of page 3).  Nothing is in quotes and nothing is inset, so
> what text is the reference referring to?  On checking the
> reference, it can be found that, in fact, the whole
> paragraph is a direct quote from the source but this is
> effectively hidden from the reader.  In other words, it
> gives the appearance that the author has developed certain
> ideas (or, at the very least, has reformulated certain ideas
> of others) when, in fact, they were simply copied verbatim
> from the work of someone else.
> 
> At Oxford Brookes, we are clear that this would be regarded
> as plagiarism (although, if there was only one instance in
> the work submitted and particularly if the student was at an
> early stage of their course, it would not be particularly
> serious plagiarism) because we believe that it is essential
> to ensure that students understand the importance of very
> clearly distinguishing between, in the biblical phrase, mine
> and thine in the work they submit for assessment.  
>  
>  
> 
>  
> 

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