Information Literacy Modules: 6 Information has Value

Copyright

Copyright is about protecting creators. Whenever someone creates something new by putting pen to paper, choreographing a dance, designing a graph, or taking a photo — it is theirs from the moment of its creation forward. And the creator's rights to benefit from that work (literary, artistic, musical, dramatic, written or unwritten) — financially or otherwise — is protected by law.

Copyright law protects authors from having their works copied without their permission. (Title 17 of the United States Code; Copyright Act of 1976 ).

When the creator of a work dies, the rights to benefit from a work pass to his/her/their family and continues for 70 years after the creator's death; at that point, the work enters the 'public domain.' Interested in learning more? Check out Copyright Basics from the Copyright Clearance Center.

Copyright 101

Literally, copyright is the "right to copy" something. Some of the rights given to the copyright owner (or creator) are:

• The right to reproduce (photocopying, scanning, digitizing, etc.)
• The right to perform (at a concert, in a conference center)
• The right to publish in print (in a book or magazine) or electronically (online)
• The right to publicly display or exhibit
• The right to adapt (e.g. making a movie script from a book)
• The right to translate
• The right to broadcast

There is a Fair Use exception to copyright but technically it is a legal defense to violating copyright law.

What Does This Mean in Daily Life?

Many people like to find cool images online and maybe use them on their social media site or use them in a blog post. Perhaps you are doing a presentation in one of your classes and want to put some images in that Powerpoint of yours. Those images you find online are mostly copyrighted! That means you are violating copyright law by not getting the owner's permission to use their work.

What Can We Do?

There is a group of people who understand that some work is really meant to be shared. Some creators are okay with someone using their photo, or drawing but want credit. Some artists would allow someone to use their work and make changes but want credit and want that new work to be used by others as well. This is where Creative Commons comes in.

 Creative Commons is an organization which helps creators legally share their work while still retaining some rights. This group helps creators license their work for certain uses so the end user does not need to seek out permission and is not violating copyright law (the permission is given ahead of time).

This chart shows the licenses available and what they cover

 The above options are available to creators to decide how they want their work to be used. As a user, you would want to search for items licensed with a Creative Commons license which would allow you to use it without getting further permission (as long as you follow the license rules). If you create works yourself, you could consider applying a Creative Commons license to allow others to share/use your work.

Searching Creative Commons

You can use the Creative Commons search to search a variety of places (Google images, Flickr, Wikimedia Commons, etc.) for items you can legally use.

In all cases, you will need to provide attribution for the items you use. You need to tell folks who created the original work. 

Plagiarism

What is Plagiarism?

Plagiarism is taking someone's work or ideas and using them as your own. Even if you put someone else's ideas in your own words (paraphrase), they were created by someone else. You need to give credit to other people for their work. 

If you give credit or cite the creator of the information, you avoid plagiarism.

The PHSC Writing Center Website has excellent information on plagiarism. Purdue Owl also has a fantastic overview on plagiarism.

Quoting, Paraphrasing, and Summarizing

Research papers require the writer to use and integrate outside sources. This process of synthesizing your own ideas with those of other authors is covered on this page from The Writing Center:

Synthesizing information from sources 

 You avoid plagiarism when quoting and paraphrasing by proper use of citations.

Citations

Citing or Documenting a source which you used, is how to avoid plagiarism. It is a scholarly way of giving credit and attribution to the creator of an idea or work you used.

Citation Styles

There are a number of documentation "styles" currently in use by researchers. Many disciplines have very specific rules concerning documentation that must be followed. Two documentation styles used by a number of disciplines are those published by the American Psychological Association (APA) and the Modern Language Association (MLA). The APA style is used primarily by disciplines in the social sciences, health and education fields while the MLA style is used primarily by disciplines in the arts, humanities, and literature.

General APA and MLA Citation Rules

Document any material you quote exactly.

• Follow the rules of the specific style concerning quotation marks.
• Keep long quotations to a minimum. Save these quotes for text expressed in a unique way.

Document any material you summarize or paraphrase.

• When you change the wording of an idea, it still remains the intellectual property of the original author.
• Do not use quotation marks when paraphrasing.
• In most research papers, you should find that the majority of your documented sources are ones that you have paraphrased or summarized.

Follow the rules of the specific style you are using regarding in-text or parenthetical references (the part of the citation that goes into the body of the paper).

• In APA style, you would include the author(s) and year of publication or in the case of a source with no author, the first few words of the title, in quotation marks, and the year of publication. If you use a direct quote, also include the pagination, if available.
• In MLA style, you would include the author(s) or in the case of a source with no author, the first few words of the title, in quotation marks. If you have accurate pagination from a pdf file, or print source include that.

The goal in documenting sources is to aim for comprehensiveness although, for many electronic sources, you will need to settle for citing whatever information is available.

• Include as much information as necessary to identify the source and allow the reader to locate it.
• Keep in mind that an Internet source that does not list full bibliographic information (especially an author and date of publication) may not be a credible source based on the evaluation criteria.

Style Manuals

Style manuals are books that illustrate how to correctly format and record information. They are most frequently consulted for information on formatting citations, but they also include a variety of other information that is useful for research, including where to find information for the bibliography, general rules of punctuation, formatting footnotes, spacing, indention, the proper form of an author's name, etc.

When your professors publish an article, they follow a style manual, too. Using the right citation style is an important part of learning to do research in your field.

There are several different styles used in research with style manuals for each style. Only two of the styles are shown here. The two that are shown below are styles which are frequently used in courses at PHSC.

Where do you find style manuals?

• Bookstores
• The reference section of academic libraries
• The reference section of some public libraries

MLA

MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers. 9th ed, Modern Language Association of America, 2021. [Available at each PHSC Library for use]

Used for literature, arts, and humanities papers.

Note: This is the style used in PHSC English Composition courses such as ENC1101

APA

Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association. 7th ed, Washington: American Psychological Association, 2020 [Available at PHSC Libraries for use]

East Campus & West Campus
Porter Campus & North Campus  

Used for psychology, education, and other social sciences papers.

Important Information: The PHSC Libraries also have a shortened version of the manual that deals with the main types of citations that you would use for a paper or project. They are free, please come and pick one up at your library. The PHSC writing center website also provides citation information.

How Do You Know Which Style Manual To Use?

• The instructor for a course will usually indicate the style you should use to write the paper and prepare your bibliography.
• The style used is also determined by the subject area in which you are conducting research and writing a paper. If you don't know, then ask.

MLA and APA

The  PHSC Writing Center  is an excellent resource for how to cite sources in both APA and MLA styles. While there are more in-depth books that cover this material, the information provided on The Writing Center site is an excellent summary of the more common citation issues. Since it is available online, it is convenient for those late "night before the paper is due" questions and for times when the library or college is closed.

APA Documentation

The Writing Center discusses what APA documentation is as well as how to format APA papers, how to format in-text citations in APA style, and how to format references in APA style:  APA Documentation 

Examples

Book

Author's Name. (Date). Title of the book. Publisher.

Book (2-20 authors)

Booth, W.C., Colomb, G. G., & Williams, J. M. (2003). The craft of research  (2nd ed.). University of Chicago Press. 

eBook

Covington, J. W. (1993). The Seminoles of Florida [electronic]. Gainesville: University Press of Florida. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=shib&db=nlebk&AN=20714&site=ehost-live&custid=phcc

Journal Articles

There are two methods depending on whether your article has a Digital Object Identifier (doi).

Authors' Names. (Date). Title of journal article. Journal Title, vol.#(issue#), page numbers.  URL of doi or URL of online article

Journal Article (doi)

Flint, A., Clegg, S., & Macdonald, R. (2006). Exploring staff perceptions of student plagiarism. Journal of Further & Higher Education, 30(2), 145-156. https://doi.org/10.1080/03098770600617562

Journal Article (no doi)

Flint, A., Clegg, S., & Macdonald, R. (2006). Exploring staff perceptions of student plagiarism. Journal of Further & Higher Education , 30 (2), 145-156. 
http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=shib&db=a9h&AN=20640764&site=ehost-live&custid=phcc

 

MLA Documentation

The Writing Center discusses what MLA documentation is as well as how to format MLA papers, how to format in-text citations in MLA style, and how to format works cited in MLA style:   MLA Documentation

Examples

Book

Author.  Book Title. Publisher, Publication Date.

Book (two authors)

Dubner, Stephen, and Steven Levitt. When to Rob a Bank: ... And 131 More Warped Suggestions and Well-Intended Rants. Morrow, 2015.

Book (three or more authors)

Moore, Randy, et al. Chronology of the Evolution-Creationism Controversy. Greenwood P, 2010.

Book (Unknown author)

Beowulf. Translated by Alan Sullivan and Timothy Murphy, edited by Sarah Anderson, Pearson, 2004.

eBook

Wray, David. Catullus and the Poetics of Roman Manhood. E-book, Cambridge UP, 2001.

Journal Articles

There are two methods depending on whether your article has a Digital Object Identifier (doi).

Author. "Article Title." Journal Title, vol. #, no. #, Year, Page(s). Database, Permalink / stable URL, or DOI.

Journal Article (doi)

Gullifer, J. M., and G. A.  Tyson. "Who Has Read the Policy on Plagiarism? Unpacking Students' Understanding of Plagiarism." Studies in Higher Education, vol. 39, no. 7, 2014, pp. 1202-18. Academic Search Complete, doi: 10.1080/03075079.2013.777412.

Journal Article (no doi)

Hansen, Brian. "Combating Plagiarism." CQResearcher, vol. 13, no. 32, 2003, pp. 773-96. CQ Researcher Plus Archive, library.cqpress.com/ cqresearcher / cqresrre2003091900.

Additional Citation Resources

In addition to the PHSC Writing Center website and the information in this module, you have a number of places you can go to get information on citations.

• APA and MLA handouts available in PHSC Libraries
• APA and MLA style manual books (available in PHSC Libraries)
• Smarthinking Tutoring - you can submit a paper to be read and have it checked for correct citations
• Purdue's online writing lab (Purdue OWL) - a reliable website for additional guidance