I went into the writing lab yesterday. Yes, they have such a thing. My English teacher told me about it. I made an appointment on line, looked on my campus map to find it and away I went. It's this little oasis of writing knowledge complete with couches and tea. It's free for all with a paper in hand and a need for assistance with all parts and pieces regarding writing. My appointment was with Alex who couldn't have been more helpful. I have reams of notes and now my head is swimming with rules on margins and headers and proper etiquette on citing. And the plagiarism! Such a fine line between parenthesis and paraphrase. He had insightful ideas not just on the formatting but the structure of my paper as well. It all sounds and feels so right and I want to pull it all together and bring it into this perfect flow. This perfect paper that I envision that it can be... Or maybe I'll just settle for a cohesive thread of thought. I'm so excited to be catching a glimpse of understanding of these things but it's also overwhelming in so many ways. So much so that it makes me want to cry And I would but I'm too damned excited to be learning how to write to let that silliness get in my way. And here's a thought, if I get arrested at least I'll have more time to write.
ACCORDING TO THE MERRIAM-WEBSTER ONLINE DICTIONARY, TO "PLAGIARIZE" MEANS
- to steal and pass off (the ideas or words of another) as one's own
- to use (another's production) without crediting the source
- to commit literary theft
- to present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source
In other words, plagiarism is an act of fraud. It involves both stealing someone else's work and lying about it afterward. And perpetrators will be dragged off to jail and flogged accordingly. (that last part was loosely paraphrased)
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