Final answer:
Plagiarism is the act of using someone else’s words or ideas without proper credit, whether intentionally or unintentionally. It's crucial to cite all sources to distinguish between one’s own ideas and borrowed ones. Effectively quoting and paraphrasing can help maintain the writer’s voice while incorporating others’ ideas.
Step-by-step explanation:
When you take material from other sources without using the proper documentation, even if it is in your own words, this is called plagiarism.
Plagiarism is an intellectual dishonesty that occurs when a person presents someone else’s work or ideas as their own.
This can happen in various forms, such as copying text without giving credit, incorrectly citing sources, or re-using your own previous work without permission.
It’s important to cite all sources correctly to avoid plagiarism, and to maintain a balance between cited information and your own original ideas. By quoting and paraphrasing effectively, you can use other people's ideas to support your own work, while still maintaining your own voice and contributing original thoughts.
Unintentional plagiarism can occur when students are careless in taking notes or do not fully understand the rules of citation.
Examples include attempting to cite sources, but doing so incorrectly, re-using an essay written for a different class without instructor permission, or forgetting to include quotation marks when directly quoting a source.
To avoid plagiarism, one must be diligent in researching and writing practices. The use of source materials should enhance one’s own analysis and contributions, rather than overwhelming the writer’s voice.
Additionally, it is not necessary to cite common knowledge or material that appears in multiple non-original sources.