Let's say you are researching a topic -- for example, cybermedia. You've found a Web page about the topic. You copy this part (below) from that Web page and paste it into a Word document:
In McLuhan's view, roads and vehicles, money, and weapons are media, just as movies, books, and radio are. Media act as extensions of the human body, and electric media are extensions of the human nervous system.
These two sentences then become part of your work, which you hand in to your instructor as an assigned article, research paper or story.
You have just committed plagiarism.
If your instructor is like me, you've just failed the course.
how to correct this example | in academic writing | in journalism
a definition of plagiarism
copyright © 2005 by mindy mcadams