Avoiding Plagiarism

Academic Integrity

As a student at Charleston Southern University, you will be interacting with the scholarly community as you write papers and produce research projects. In doing so, you should follow these practices:

• cite sources that you utilize (books, articles, images, and more) 
• avoid cheating on exams
• document how you conducted your research

The Writing Center at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill explains that "Academic integrity is the commitment to and demonstration of honest and moral behavior in an academic setting." 

In short, remember to give credit where credit is due.

What is Plagiarism?

According to the CSU Undergraduate Academic Integrity Policy, "plagiarism is the taking or attempted taking of an idea, writing, a graphic, music composition, art or datum of another without giving proper credit and presenting or attempting to present it as one’s own.  It is also taking written materials of one’s own that have been used for a previous course assignment and using it without reference to it in its original form" (Charleston Southern University Student Handbook, p. 10).

The term Plagiarism comes from the Latin for kidnapper (plagiarius). Therefore, just like it is wrong to kidnap a person, it is wrong to kidnap (i.e., plagiarize) someone's ideas.

Please watch the short video below for an overview, then click Next

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