The Very Harsh Truth About Plagiarism In Academia

My honest, unfiltered thoughts about plagiarism, and what I tell a lot of international undergraduates who don’t get it.

I typically use far more indirect, diplomatic language about this topic, to be honest.

But if you come from cultures and countries that see no problem with looking the other way when students copy or take ideas that don’t belong to them…

Well, they need to know how much trouble they can get into within American academia before it’s too late.

I will often start out by explaining to students that there’s a reason math teachers make you show your work in solving a problem…they usually get that one.

The same is true when you write an essay or a research paper.

I tell them the story of how my old British Literature professor told my class back in college, “You are writing essays for me so that I can see the quality of your mind.”

The purpose of academic life is to help you master your mind and develop superior ways to think about your world and respond to it in ways that benefit it.

A better quality of mind leads to a higher quality of life for yourself and all those you will ever engage in.

But sometimes, I will get the rare student or two who don’t really know why or care about such things.

It’s usually because they are simply looking for the easy hack to get good grades and the degree, money, and reputation that comes with them.

I know that I’ve had one student from the Middle East, and a few from China like this, to be honest.

For them, I will be far more blunt.

Now it’s a matter of character.

I tend to frame it as laziness…starting with how lazy they have to be to not even bother trying to think for themselves.

In the case of the Middle Eastern student, I reminded him of a saying the Prophet (pbuh) says in the Hadith: “The most excellent Jihad is the conquest of Self.”

And then I tell him that every time he gives into the temptation to plagiarize, he is losing that battle.

With other students, such ethical and cultural appeals go unheeded.

So, I tell them straight-up that it’s considered theft and so there are often harsh consequences, especially the more you do it.

“And the higher up the ladder of academia you are, the greater penalties you get for plagiarism”, I tell them. Some of these things can follow you far into whatever career you wish to have.

I really do completely understand where the students come from, though.

I’ve lived and taught in other countries where pirating ideas and products is not considered to be an ethical weakness or an actual crime as it is in the West.

Unless I was working with students who wanted to study abroad, I worked within the cultural expectations, because it is a very different game we were playing in those academic environments.

But if students decide to play those kinds of games in North American academia, they are going to get crushed in ways they cannot yet conceive of.

So any teacher worth a damn is going to at least make the rules of the game clear, and be honest about how rulebreakers will be perceived and what might consequently happen to them.

I have found that a balance between compassionate understanding and sometimes brutal honesty is best when dealing with culture bumps like these.

What are you doing to make sure the scholarly work you write or present is original, and that you are giving credit to those ideas that are not your own?

If you have any concerns or questions about the expectations and rules your professors have about these matters, let me know in the comments.

I would love to be of service to you!

Brandon

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Thanks for stopping by.

I empower university students to reach their true potential by mastering their mindset and academic English communication skills while learning to navigate the culture of American academia.

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