>I am fascinated by this sudden spate of messages about suspected plagiarism.
. . . something to do with the time of year? (finals)
>How does a suspicion of plagiarism arise when you haven't a clue what has
>been plagiarised?
In many cases suspicion can be aroused by the work not having the written
'style' of a candidate's previous work. Also, if the candidate has not
attended any supervision sessions, or suddenly comes to one clutching an
almost fully-formed dissertation, it can make one suspicious.
Where plagiarism is embedded into the candidates own writing, the
difference between writing styles is even more evident. When I used to run
undergrad dissertation modules, I used to show students a mock-up of
embedded plagiarism and ask them to try and spot the stolen writing. They
nearly all spot it, and it points out how easy bad plagiarism is to spot.
None of these are hard-and-fast indicators, it's either passages you
recognise or gut feelings. I figure this list becomes a home for the gut
feeling cases.
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