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Plagiarism and Academic Honesty

Understanding plagiarism and how to avoid it

Definition of Plagiarism

Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines plagiarism as follows:

transitive verb
: to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own : use (another's production) without crediting the source
intransitive verb
: to commit literary theft : present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source
— pla·gia·riz·er noun

Definition of Common Knowledge

According to the Online Learning Library of the University System of Georgia, common knowledge "is information that the majority of people either know or can find in a number of sources. Common knowledge is factual information that is beyond dispute. Sure, you might not remember (or ever have known) what Georgia's state bird is, but you can easily look it up in an almanac, encyclopedia, the state's Web site, or other resource. If you're not sure whether something is common knowledge or not, go ahead and provide a reference for it" 

A Fair(y) Use Tale (Learn about copyright principles with those nice Disney cartoons)

"Professor Eric Faden of Bucknell University created this humorous, yet informative, review of copyright principles delivered through the words of the very folks we can thank for nearly endless copyright terms"  

From Stanford Law School, The Center for Internet and Society.   Professor Faden's work is licenced under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License .