ELC 550: ENGLISH FOR ACADEMIC

WRITING

INSTRUCTOR: NURHAFIZAH ALI

 WHAT IS PLAGIARISM?
• The term “plagiarism” means copying someone else’s words or ideas and passing
them off as your own

• It is considered as a form of cheating as the original source and authors are not
credited or acknowledged

• Plagiarism is a serious academic offence and students who plagiarise may fail a
class or even be expelled from university
COMMON FORMS OF PLAGIARISM MADE BY
STUDENTS
• Copying, paraphrasing, summarizing, or quoting directly from text books, journals,
online sources or any other sources without citing the source of information

• Failing to acknowledge the author (s) and source (s) for any ideas and facts used in
writing

• Copying and pasting materials directly from online sources

• Changing a few words, phrases or the sentence order of the original text and passing
them off as their own

• Coping a friend’s work or assignment even with the friend’s consent

HOW TO AVOID PLAGIARISM?
Documentation

In-text citations

Quotations

Paraphrasing

Summarizing

List of references
1. DOCUMENTATION

The following are a few examples of documentation styles on how to cite a

variety of sources in research writing:

 APA (American Psychological Association)

 MLA (Modern Language Association)
 AIP (American Institute of Physic)
 IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers)
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There are a few basics you need to know about each source (regardless
of the citation style you use):

• Title of the work

• Author(s)
• Publisher/source
• Year of publication
• Type (book, journal, tweet, interview, film, etc...)
2. IN-TEXT CITATIONS

• Citing source within your text is call in-text citation

• In-text citations include the author’s last name and the year the material was
published

example:

A study conducted on students’ writing skills at the tertiary level shows that more than half of
the student population has problems in writing academic paper (Alias, 2012)

Alias (2012) found that more than 50% of university students have difficulties in writing their
academic papers
3. QUOTATIONS

• It is acceptable to quote the original statement if you are not able to convey
the meaning that the author has by using paraphrasing
• You may also use quotations if you are concerned that the meaning might be
altered or the importance of the information might be reduced when you
paraphrase it
• The page number of the original source of the article should be included in
the in-text citation when a direct quote is taken from a source

example:
According to Chomsky (1965), “Linguistic theory is concerned primarily with an ideal
speaker-listener …”(p.3)
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If the quotation is more than 40 words long, then it needs to be written in

a separate paragraph where quotation marks are not necessary.

example:
Linguistic theory is concerned primarily with an ideal speaker-
listener, in a completely homogenous speech community, who
knows its language perfectly and is unaffected by such
grammatically irrelevant conditions as memory limitation,
distractions, shifts of attention and interest, and errors (random or
characteristic) in applying his knowledge of the language in actual
performance.

(Chomsky, 1965, p.3)

4. PARAPHRASING

• Paraphrasing is re-stating or expressing another person’s ideas using your

own words to avoid plagiarism
• Do not forget to include citation at the end of each paraphrase
Original source:
Anger is a completely normal, usually healthy, human emotion. But when it gets out
of control and turns destructive, it can lead to problems – problems at work, in your
personal relationships, and in the overall quality of your life.

Paraphrased:
Anger is a common human feeling that could turn nasty when it gets out of control. It
can cause problems at the workplace, in one’s personal interactions and in the
general quality of one’s life (American Psychological Association, 2015)
5. SUMMARISING

• A good summary gives only main ideas, it does not include details
• Before you begin to write, you should think about who, when,
where, why, what and how
• To summarise, look out for the key words and main ideas in the text
and rewrite them using your own words
• You must still provide citation at the end of the summarised text
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Original source Summary

Recycling refers to the process of collecting used Recycled wastes are used as raw materials
materials which are usually considered as ‘waste’ for manufacturing new goods (Stallon,
and reprocessing them. In this process, these 2000)
used materials are sorted and processed to be
used as ‘raw materials’ for the production of new
products.
6. LIST OF REFERENCES

• You must ensure that every in-text citations must appear in the reference
section of your research paper. The table show some examples of in-text
citations and references using APA style

In-text citation Sources of reference References

(Chomsky, 1965) Text book Chomsky, N. (1965). Aspects of the theory of syntax.
Cambridge, MA: MIT Press

(Maclntyre & Gardner, Journal article Maclntyre, P. & Gardner, R. (1994). The subtle effects of
1994) language anxiety on cognitive processing in the second
language. Language Learning, 44(2), 283 – 305

(Opal, 2008) Website Opal, D. (2008). How young children learned English as
another language. Retrieved on 15 August 2010 from
http://www.britishcouncil.org/Vietnam-English.htm
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Reference:

Arumugam, N et.al. (2018). Step up academic writing skills. Malaysia:

Penerbit Press Universiti Teknologi MARA