Plagiarism Plagiarism Plagiarism is the use of someone else s words or ideas without giving that person credit. It is the cardinal sin of students and scholars.
Plagiarism is essentially fraud, since the plagiarist gets the credit for someone else s work.
Apart from being morally wrong, plagiarism makes it impossible to evaluate what the plagiarist knows or understands, since he or she is simply passing on someone else s material. Using sections of books, course readings, web pages, prepared lecture notes, or another student s work all constitute plagiarism. If two students turn in work with identical phrases, one or both has plagiarized. Do not plagiarize. If I detect what I consider to be significant, intentional plagiarism in any written assignment, the assignment will receive zero credit.