Hello!
My thanks as well for all of the comments. They will certainly help me
further explain this phenomenon to my students.
Just to wax nostalgic for a moment, I remember being taught not to steal
other people's ideas back in elementary school (and that was 35-30
years ago). Now I know we're talking about a variety of things here
(expressing things as they do in one's professional community,
boilerplate phrases, cognitive appropriacy of tasks) and I think these
are all valid things in academic writing at the higher education level.
However, it boggles the mind as to why are we dealing with the basic
concept of plagiarism at the university level.
Now I know my rant is not going to solve anything (but it feels good to
rant) and the reality is such that we Academic Writing teachers (aka
police) are the last line of defence against this sort of thing but, as
a relatively new teacher of Academic Writing, I just feel that we're a
bit high on the food chain for this.
I realize that different cultures deal with plagiarism in different ways
(I'm Canadian and I teach students from many different countries) but I
would have hoped that academic integrity is globally held in somewhat
higher esteem than it appears to be. What happened? Why aren't teachers
in earlier levels of education saying anything about this? Or are they?
And if so, what are they saying? This directly concerns point 3 of Mary
Ellen's summed up points below. Why isn't "the sense of how to clearly
mark off your own ideas and others' and when... strong in many sciences
now"? (Kerans, 2010) J
...end of rant.
Happy spring!
--Paula
**************************************
Paula Haapanen
Coordinating Lecturer - English
Language Centre
Lappeenranta University of Technology
PO Box 20
53851 Lappeenranta
Finland
Phone: + 358 (0)5 621 2213 (direct)
From: European Association for the Teaching of Academic Writing -
discussions [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of M. Ellen Kerans
Sent: 7. toukokuuta 2010 14:06
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Do SS learn to plagiarize in our classes?
Thank you for this because you emphasize some points I've tried to bring
to instruction (now from an outsider's vantage in the world of author's
editing - i.e., pre-acceptance editing - and journal copyediting -
though I still teach a bit). May I summarize your points that I consider
to be very important to remember when planning instruction or orienting
(advanced) students? In this, I'm attempting to state the "problems" and
imply the solutions for instructors or mentors from the journal editors'
point of view as I understand it.
1. Long noun phrases are common and can be considered to have
status as terms in many fields. (Yes, they could be shortened after
they've first been established in a text, but they need to appear in
their entirety somewhere; otherwise reading is made difficult.) This is
why the "six-word string" criterion of some plagiarism detection
software won't be very useful. It's also why all electronic detection
outputs should be interpreted by a human being who is familiar with the
literature in the field, before plagiarism is assumed.
2. Certain longish predicate phrases or clauses, especially in the
methods and results sections, should also be given the status of
"boilerplate phrases" equivalent to the sort John pointed out yesterday
as useful metalinguistic phrases for linking ideas. (There are just so
many ways to express statistical results, for example, and to deviate is
to change the meaning or display your lack of knowledge of a technique
and how it's talked about in that community.) Furthermore, certain
multicenter studies will have whole paragraphs that are boilerplates -
to tie a vast body of research together. A human interpreter of
plagiarism detection software outputs needs to know this.
3. "Words unacknowledged" = plagiarism is a fair way to put it, OK.
However, many of us are dealing with authors who are learning from
mentors who themselves don't know much about citing (acknowledgment
protocols) and when to put quotes around exact wording. There are few
examples to follow in the sciences-for both good and bad reasons. (Note
how often applied linguists even put quotes around two-to-four word
phrases to express that a turn of phrase belongs to the cited author,
possibly because research on the ground is thin as you say. Quotes
around short segments seldom appear in the sciences, and when they do,
they're often so-called scare quotes suggesting disagreement or lack of
evidence. Lack of quotes is appropriate if the scientist is using the
type of phrasing mentioned in points 1 and 2 above. On other occasions -
the expression of points of view or interpretation or when clause-length
explanations are incorporated, it probably would be necessary to
acknowledge that phrasing is exact and just putting a cite at the end of
a sentence is insufficient.) A problem is that where lines are drawn
isn't being well handed down in many settings nowadays. The sense of how
to clearly mark off your own ideas and others' and when phrasing matters
isn't strong in many sciences now.
4. I think you're so very right that tasks that are often not
really within the cognitive abilities of undergraduates are being set
these days in university classes (and not just EAP courses). Fixing this
alone would solve many problems. What's needed are tasks requiring
"bridge genres" - ways students can practice and gradually build up a
sense of how to use the language to participate in their field.
5. I also think it's right to warn instructors off overemphasizing
paraphrasing activities as the best response to avoidance of plagiarism
on the student level (you say "EAP teachers get hung up on the words
rather than ideas or findings") . Plagiarism disappears from the
classroom (in my experience) when the task set is cognitively
appropriate and when a student writer focuses on the idea he or she
wishes to explain - to an appropriately imagined reader, such as a smart
younger cousin who's also interested in the field. Soon, natural marking
of "my idea" vs "their ideas/facts" emerges from the student's words and
citing begins to make sense to them. (In engineering, by the way, I find
the tasks set by Michael Alley and the groups he works with to be the
type of bridge task I'm talking about.)
The only contributions I'd like to add:
1) I think that some of the repetition I think you're seeing in your
Google searches is a result of the fact that "compilation theses" (Am:
dissertations) are increasingly common. In case anyone's not familiar
with this practice, essentially the doctoral student must publish the
articles first, before "writing" (compiling) the thesis/dissertation.
Then, the thesis itself is a compilation of those articles - in their
exact forms - plus an introductory chapter summarizing the history and
subsequent events in the field, plus the usual acknowledgements. This
certainly isn't plagiarism. It's "complilation".
2) The hope that ("The Journal obviously doesn't think this is
plagiarism") may be optimistic because reviewers do not detect
plagiarism. This is the ostensible reason why journal editors are now
becoming more indignant about both duplicate publication and plagiarism
(hence the CrossCheck publisher's project). The community still views
this as a transgression, however. Sometimes editors go on the rampage.
Sometimes they get the tone of their reactions wrong. (See last year's
fiasco reported in Nature, 30 July 2009, Abbot), so young authors who
see their mentors have been copy-pasting for years may be rudely
undercut at some point. COPE has a flowchart with a protocol for editors
to follow, but few editors are members of COPE!
Finally: "boilerplate" comes from the practice of newspaper printers
using heavy (boilerplate) steel to set certain parts of a newspaper that
would have to be reprinted often - like mastheads. (Just thought someone
might find that tidbit interesting.)
Mary Ellen Kerans
Translation & Editing - Writing & Education
Barcelona, Spain
Tel/Fax: 34 934 080997
[log in to unmask] <mailto:[log in to unmask]> or
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________________________________
From: European Association for the Teaching of Academic Writing -
discussions [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Alexander, Olwyn
Sent: Friday, May 07, 2010 10:09 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: FW: Do SS learn to plagiarize in our classes?
Forwarded from a colleague who is not on the list but interested in the
discussion.
________________________________
From: Jenifer Spencer [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: 06 May 2010 20:49
To: Alexander, Olwyn
Subject: Re: Do SS learn to plagiarize in our classes? Jenifer's Rant
Hi
My understanding is that it is plagiarism if you steal someone else's
ideas or words unacknowledged.That is regardless if you used their exact
words (which is easier to spot and prove) or your own words but it
really is their original idea or especially their experimental results,
which is the worst form of academic plagiarism. EAP teachers get hung up
on the words rather than ideas or findings, because they cannot see the
trees for the words! They think that seeing the same words means
plagiarism. Actually, it can just mean that is what is being studied or
discussed in a discourse community. Consider this e.g. from a PhD in
Petroleum engineering:
Besson (1990) developed an improved semi-analytical correlation for the
geometrical skin factor of a fully penetrating deviated well in an
isotropic formation.
Google advanced search gives lots of results for phrases almost
identical to this 20-word NP - many of them from the same Journal and
set of conferences. I googled other longish phrases from the PhD at
random and each time this threw up many other articles with the same
phrases.This is because this is what this group of engineers is studying
and therefore what they talk about in their communications. The Journal
obviously doesn't think this is plagiarism- in fact I would imagine they
would refuse to publish anything that didn't have a high proportion of
appropriate, predictable 'set noun-phrases' like these, as it might
indicate that the author was not in fact an authentic member of this
discourse community. These phrases often have a good many more than 6
words in common. Perhaps it says more about the paucity of ideas or
research in political 'science' that six words in common would indicate
plagiarism!!!
I think that the real confusion is engendered by he fact that essays set
in EAP courses are often on subjects that students know little about and
that they can contribute few ideas of their own to. This encourages
students, in desperationu to add quotes from the internet about topics
they only half understand- because they are outside that discourse
community. What is needed is for EAP teachers and subject lecturers to
get the students inside the discourse community as quickly as possible.
Actually, the PhD quoted above (and I have reason to suppose it is
considered a good one in the peer group, as the author has already been
published) and all those other sources I found in the Google search,
could be considered as 'patchwork writing': they have hardly a single
'original' phrase between all of them: as well as the repetitive
technical phrases, the writers stick rigidly to formulaic academic
phrases and collocations taught in general EGAP courses- they are
exactly like all the depised 'models' of 'boiler-plating- probably
because that is how you make boilers!
However, it is clear that these writers are having a vibrant debate and
exchange of ideas. Here is a field that is moving on so rapidly that the
participants are willingly 'standing on each other's shoulders' to
facilitate this rapid development.They use this restricted code of
communication for speed and ease of communication (and probably to
acknowledge the reality that a very large number of these authors and
readers are NNS, who don't need any language challenges beyond the
conceptual and mathematical difficulty their field already poses).
Perhaps more originality of language might be found in fields where
research is thinner on the ground. It would be interesting to find a
field where there is little progress being made and see if that is where
the fancy 'original' language is to be found??
If you put a socking-big acknowledged quote from another writer, it
might be considered rather a weak thing to do but it is certainly not
plagiarism- it is done in all academic books (including our own) and I
think the writers quoted are usually pleased to see their work given
such high exposure: it's a way of saying- look, you should really listen
to what X says about this, or sometimes a way of representing the writer
fairly if we are about to challenge their ideas.
So, I think student plagiarism (as distinct from the serious type of
research stealing in professional academia) is more about being outside
the discourse community, and they will need those boiler plates to make
the boilers- they just need the opportunity to have something meaningful
to say about something they know enough about to an audience they are
aware of.
Feel free to share this with your discussion group, if you think it has
any useful points.
All the best]
Jenifer
Materials Writer,
teacher training, editing, proofreading and collaborative writing
e-mail: [log in to unmask]
tel. +44(0) 1313333747
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