The Problem of Plagiarism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

The Problem of Plagiarism - Essay Example activities besides plagiarism; however, the ultimate impression that the reader should gain from such a statistic is that the practice is both widespread and increasingly pervasive. As this is an issue that effects the academic integrity of the learning institutions that exist as well as the quality and type of education that the students receive, this brief essay will seek to explain a few of the ways in which plagiarism works to cheat not only the student of valuable educational merit but the underlying roots of the educational system as well. The most pressing concern when dealing with the topic of plagiarism and its derivatives is to clearly define and differentiate what specifically plagiarism entails and how intertextuality and paraphrase plays into such a working definition. A most basic definition of plagiarism therefore hinges upon the fact that plagiarism can be defined by attempting to pass off another individual’s work as one’s own. Similarly, intertextuality is a far more gray concept (Hansen 189). Whereas paraphrasing is not necessarily a bad thing as long as it is cited appropriately, intertextuality is similar in that it requires the author to plainly note the manner of the sources that provoked the response that is being presented. In this way, the difference between plagiarism and incorporating useful points of intertextuality hinges upon the ability of the student to incorporate relevant and pertinent citations regarding the material they are dealing with. Firstly, consider the fact of what the educational system itself represents. Ultimately, it is a system that has a primary objective to impart knowledge to the participants within the process. One particularly effective means of doing this is to engage the participant with varying forms of feedback. Assigning papers, responses, critical analyses, discussion speeches etc are but a few ways of achieving such a goal. By means of eliciting this â€Å"feedback† system into the