alixtii | A Prescriptivist Take on Plagiarism

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A Prescriptivist Take on Plagiarism

The "plagiarism = use without attribution" meme is going around again, and whenever it does, it really, really bugs me because by that standard Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot are both plagiarists--and any standard which results in that conclusion is for me a reductio ad absurdum.

miriam_heddy has a good post discussing some of the issues here, but there are some things I want to say myself--mostly, I think, in parallel with her. She writes:

Plagiarism, like "technique" is judged not by intent but by effect, hence a writer's arguments that "I didn't mean to plagiarize" or "It was supposed to be a pastiche" aren't relevant when it comes to writing published or put out there to be read by someone other than the author. Or, as Stanley Fish points out with respect to irony not as a "fact" but as a "way of reading": The decision a reader makes will have been possible only in relation to decision procedures that have been authorized by the institution.

I'm not 100% sure whether she is writing in her own voice or merely summarizing a certain paradigm; her post is mostly descriptive, analyzing (quite well) the way "plagiarism" functions as a normative concept differently in academia and in fandom. But it doesn't really matter, because it's the paradigm cited above to which I'm going to respond in this moment as I make my extremely prescriptive argument as to what plagiarism is and is not. Under my view, the claim above isn't wrong so much as it is misleading, and (as

miriam_heddy clearly recognizes) parallels issues of author intentionality in general. So I'd accept her use of Fish, but modify it with a use of Foucault (drawing on "What is an Author?").

It's not as simple as "what the author meant" or even "what the reader thinks," but a more complex hybrid: "what the reader thinks the author meant." The author's intentions are very much involved, but only insofar as constructed by the reader, as an author-function. Which was in my mind when I hazarded that perhaps ethics is about constructing a moral-agent function. I say in that post, parenthetically, regarding the then-recent "American President"/

reel_sga wank (ETA: see here, courtesy of

fairestcat), in which large portions of Sorkin dialogue were used in an SGA fusion:

The most damning facts about the accused parties in the recent cases is the way in which they are reported to have acted after producing the texts, the comments they made which interpretive conventions lead us to read as to having been made in their own voices and thus cause us to construct their intent in a certain way, as being having not made a good-faith effort. I say this without firsthand knowledge. A fact can be damning without being true.

In other words, the problem wasn't that they used other texts in their own without citation, but that when people complimented on those specific passages, they didn't say, "Thanks! Eliot really could write couldn't he?" but instead accepted the praise for themselves. That is the dividing line between allusion and plagiarism, I continue to insist.

I've already made it clear I've posted in this issue before; most recently was here, when I linked to this

languagelog post with commentary, which gave the following distinction between plagiarism and allusion (I quoted it even more extensively in my previous post):

That's the subtle line between plagiarism and literary allusion. It's plagiarism if you copy someone's writing and you don't want it to be noticed that you were copying; it's allusion if you do exactly the same but you do want it to be noticed.

Note the reliance on (a readerly construct of?) authorial intent here; what matters is not whether something is noticed or not noticed but whether (we think) the alleged plagiarist wanted the plagiarism to be noticed. She could have misjudged her audience, and expected they would, say, recognize Buffy quotes in a Harry Potter fic, when it turns out they actually don't (what's wrong with them?). (I certainly don't recognize all of Pound's allusions in the Cantos, but that's why I have a trusty compendium--it's my fault for not living up to Pound's rather clear expectations, not his fault for having too high expectations.) I cited the Angel quotes in this XMM fic just to be safe, but I really feel like I shouldn't have had to do that--it was a virtual certainty that my flist would recognize the scene I was paying homage to. I could have been wrong (although judging by the response, I wouldn't have been), but it would still have been in good faith.

Of course, it's fairly easy to construct the intent of an author/moral agent who utilizes a passage from an obscure passage of which no one has ever heard; equally easy is it to construct that of one who uses an instantly recognizable line of Shakespeare. The problematic cases which lie in the grey area between are much harder to judge, but my inclination is always, in the name of increased artistic freedom, to give the author the benefit of the doubt.

miriam_heddy certainly seems to recognize all of this:

if a fanfic story includes dialogue from an episode and a reader doesn't recognize it and praises the writer for coming up with such a clever line, fandom ethics generally dictate that the fan writer write back and say, "Yeah--that was a great line, but it's canon" rather than sit back and accept the praise for a line s/he didn't write.

[. . .]

So what if a fan writer takes a whodunnit plot from a not-so-well-known text and uses it, with little or no modification, as the basis for her television fandom story without giving the plot author credit? If a fan reader says, "Great story!", should the writer (even if the reader make no reference to the plot) catch herself and say, "Thanks!" and then, in the interest of full disclosure, add a note saying, "I borrowed the plot from a novel by ____"? Is it the responsibility of the writer to pre-emptively give credit for all texts from which material was borrowed? Is it enough to just give a blanket "thanks" to that other author without specifying how much of a debt the fanwriter owes to that writer's published text?

Yet

miriam_heddy remains in the descriptivist mode; in the end, she seems happy to simply try to more clearly articulate what the fannish mores are which pervail at this socio-historical location:

even though discussions of Cassie Claire's stories may have introduced "pastiche" into the vocabulary of fandom, it hasn't yet been picked up enough that fans regularly recognize and accept and sanction the incorporation of another (non-canon) writer's sentences and paragraphs (as fans do recognize "remix" and "OTP" and "AU" as legitimate, fannish genres).

I'm not happy with that, because I'm afraid that if Eliot and Pound were in fandom, the fen would burn them in effigy right next to [insert accused plagiarist here], and I'm more than willing to take a normative stance on that as a very bad thing. If we're continuing the paralleling of ethics and literary criticism, my stance can be compared to feminist or post-colonial criticism: readings of a text given to multiple interpretations, but with a strong normative claim about the way we should be reading. There is something specifically deficient and detrimental about a definition of plagiarism as strictly equivalent to mere "use without attribution."

Note that I have no opinion on whether any specific individual is or is not a plagiarist by the standards I suggest (for one thing, I have no experience of their audiences, and thus what those audiences could reasonably be expected to know); I only want to ensure that all individuals are judged by the correct set of standards. The target of people's scorn may well deserve it; but when dishing it out, there's a very real danger in nonetheless painting with too wide a brush.

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See, I saw Miriam's post to come out with a reader/writer contract where citations and homages were a function of readers' awareness (and I always forget the link to that great essay that addresses just that in terms of when allusions and references become incomprehensible and thus enter dangerous territory...it had a shakespeare quote in the title?).

So, it seems to me that she's not wanting to burn Eliot and pound as much as she'd expect them to know their audience--and the revised wasteland suggests just that, doesn't it?

As far as I can tell, the only audience Pound can really be said to know is himself--although since some of the allusions in the Cantos are done completely from memory while under armed guard, I don't know how fair that is.

The Revised Wasteland seems designed to obfuscate at least as much as clarify, as much as I can see.

The thing with Pound and Eliot, as I see it, is that they worked to make their audiences fit their art, rather than the other way around. (Suddenly feels very elitist--must be the prescriptivism kick.)

But as a response to Miriam's post, I do see her as describing a culture in which what she calls pastiche is very much not an option. Furthermore, I fear she might be right as to her description of that culture. I don't want to lump Miriam in with the people arguing that "plagiarism = unattributed use," though, even if I do think she's describing them in large part, because her position is clearly much more sophisticated.

i don't know how the "death of the author" theories apply to nonfiction, so i'm flying blind here.

but to me, as a teacher, i have to go with author's intent. if you steal someone else's work and pass it off as your own because you're too lazy to do the writing yourself, that's plagiarism.

if you quote a line from a song and assume i know the song, that's not plagiarism. but this kind of literary allusion assumes so much between reader and writer, you know?

pastiche is a recognized form of writing, but don't you have to give some kind of author's note or alert that that's the form you're using? like the remixes or the putting your fan characters into a movie plot?

what you said about the reader being supposed to notice the material from the other author is key. if you hope the reader DOESN"T notice, that you can pretend YOU thought it up, that's plagiarism.

i have to explain very carefully to my 18 year olds what is plagiarism and what isn't, and how they can't just go to wikipedia and cut and paste stuff for their paper. they really don't know. so what people get taught is important.

i don't see how you can talk about plagiarism and literary allusions and jazz quoting in solos and pastiches without getting into authorial intent.

*ponders*

Well, for me the "death of the author" stuff only applies so far as the recognition that we don't have perfect access to authorial intent--so we have to guess. In most or even all of the high-profile cases where an accused plagiarist used work from a source from outside fandom, she always claimed that her intent was to pastiche or homage or whatever. The thing is, the fans didn't believe her--and sometimes for good reason. And so, like all interpretation (I would argue), it ends up depending on a readerly construction of authorial intent.

but this kind of literary allusion assumes so much between reader and writer, you know?

But this is fandom--glorious collaborative intertextuality, queer female space/minstrel show, slash the slasher, writing porn is like baking cookies, community of readers who are also writers fandom. If that type of assumption can be made anywhere at all, it's here.

oh absolutely: the assumed body of knowledge inside the fanfic community of a show or a book or a movie is what it all rests on -- that hive mind stuff.

so yeah.

i haven't followed very many of the plagiarism scandals in fandom; most of the ones i have followed have been very straightforward: fan writer steals another fan writer's story, usually from a different fandom, changes the character names and posts it somewhere in her own fandom, passing it off as her own work. original writer is alerted and points out the stealing of said story.

i can see how when a writer claims pastiche with works outside fandom, and readers take issue with that or don't believe it: different and harder to figure out? but i don't know any particulars there. so yeah.

i did hear of a situation where fan writer A claimed fan writer B had plagiarized her (within a fandom) by using the same setup or plot premise for a first-time romance between the same 2 characters writer A had been writing about.... but that seems like something that could be coincidence.

Of course, it's fairly easy to construct the intent of an author/moral agent who utilizes a passage from an obscure passage of which no one has ever heard

Could you clarify this please? I'm really not sure what this kind of passage might be, except I'm pretty sure you don't mean that literally no one has ever heard of it.

Well, at the true extreme that would literally be the case--if you are an archeologist and find The Gospel of Anne that no one else alive has ever read, and use it in your fanfic without citation, then that's plagiarism without question.

Not quite as extreme, but still pretty clearly plagiarism for me, I own a couple books that were vanity published by a local community figure. There's no way anyone on my flist not there because we went to high school together would have read the books--and since I went to a private school some towns over, I have strong doubts even then.

A potboiler in a genre not often read by fansis further into the grey area, but possibly not by much, a beloved work of children's literature may well be coming out the other side into "not plagiarism," etc.

Is that any clearer?

then that's plagiarism without question.

Yes, but, if said archaeologist (we'll call him Daniel Jackson for convenience!) found the Gospel, wrote and posted the fanfic that relied on it heavily, and buried it on a planet about to be engulfed in supernova, then no one would know -- could even begin to guess -- that it had been plagiarized. (Textual critics *might* get suspicious if it were different from his usual writing style, or seemed like two pieces woven together, or whatever, but even they wouldn't know for sure.

So, I guess my point is, from a theoretical perspective it's easy to say "that's a case of plagiarism," but in actuality it would be impossible for anyone to judge because it would be so well-hidden.

Huh. I don't know. I think I'm kind of stuck here because of all the unconscious borrowing I (and I assume most people) do. I don't cite Joss Whedon every time I speak, though by rights I properly should; Gvambat, you, and Elizabeth have influenced my fannish sensibility so much that you should probably get nodded to in beta notes on every fic.

... yeah. I think it's the way that I keep a writer's notebook and collect interesting bits of conversation, song lyrics and poetry and my boss's complete inability to spell -- we're always borrowing, always depending on other texts for our texts' meanings, and while direct and lengthy quotations should be cited, I don't think it's actually possible or desirable to cite everything.

It's true that the clearer the case of plagiarism, the more likely the plagiarist is to get away with it. This . . . doesn't bother me.

And I'm arguing that the account of plagiarism used by fandom (as described by Miriam) should be loosened somewhat; for my influence on you to count as plagiarism, I think that account would actually need to be made much, much stricter.

I'm arguing that the account of plagiarism used by fandom (as described by Miriam) should be loosened somewhat;

Uh, in case it's not clear, I agree with you.

regarding the then-recent reel_sga wank (anybody have a good citation there? the F_W wiki doesn't have anything), in which large portions of Sorkin dialogue were used in an SGA fusion

My own post on that whole situation can be found here. The post itself is somewhat biased, since I'm the one who reported her, but it links to the mod post over at

mckay_sheppard, which has a rather lively discussion from both sides in the comments. The story itself wasn't written for

reel_sga by the way, it's just that it was posted around about the same time as those stories, so they naturally came into the discussion.

Will update with the link--thank you!

The story itself wasn't written for reel_sga by the way, it's just that it was posted around about the same time as those stories, so they naturally came into the discussion.

I had either forgotten that or was confused on the issue from the beginning, so thanks for setting me straight.

First of all, stuff like this is why I have a huge internets-crush on you. As if being a boy-feminist-femslasher wasn't enough, you quote Fish and Foucault in the same paragraph. ♥ Being a wank historian, however, I do feel compelled to comment on this:

She could have misjudged her audience, and expected they would, say, recognize Buffy quotes in a Harry Potter fic, when it turns out they actually don't (what's wrong with them?).

The author you are alluding to was criticized for the Buffy stuff, but the stickiest cries of "plagiarism" are related to her having lifted passages nearly verbatim from a few of Pamela Dean's novels. These books were were, I believe, out of print at the time, so she could not have had a reasonable expectation that her readers would recognize that; nor was it an obscure reference adding allusive meaning for those in the know. (Apparently, of course.)

And this is where the reader's supposition of intent comes in. Did she mean to pass off superior prose as her own creative insight? Is her claim of an eidetic but scatterbrained memory plausible -- do we believe that she "accidentally" reproduced passages of a book she read and reread as a young woman? How would you "prescribe" that we judge her? And do you think the strange social nuances of fandom, wherein BNFs are often deemed patently untrustworthy schemers, should factor in?

I'm aware of that, and I considered rephrasing, but the fact of the matter is that the reader still has to do the work--any one in the know enough to recognize ("correctly" or "incorrectly," whatever those words would mean under the context) it as a vieled reference to Cassie Clare also knows enough to know (or at least believe--I, for one, have no idea what really went down) that that's not the whole story. And the fact is, the example, when divorced from its history, brings a clarity to the situation that few invented examples would, due to the way BtVS and HP function in fandom.

I'm not disagreeing (or agreeing) that the evidence in any specific case isn't damning; I'm just making the claim it's not damning for the reason some people seem to be claiming it is. (The distinction between Whedon and Dean, which I agree is absolutely crucial, gets painted over among the vitriol.)

The distinction between Whedon and Dean, which I agree is absolutely crucial, gets painted over among the vitriol.

Good point. I think when some of her readers found out that this allegedly witty dialogue (sorry, not a Buffy fan) that they'd been praising CC for was not hers, they felt betrayed -- perhaps because there's more emotional proximity within fandom. If I don't recognize an Eliot allusion and then later find out that something I thought was his was actually someone else's, I don't feel much of anything except dumb because I don't have anything invested in Eliot's "honesty."

I know I'm going rather far afield, but from a descriptive perspective, it's interesting to note how people's plagiarism radar changes in different contexts.

this allegedly witty dialogue (sorry, not a Buffy fan) that they'd been praising CC for

Well, it's wittier when it makes sense in context and isn't coming from Draco.

But that's what really makes or break it for me, when a writer is praised for a plagiarized passage; if a writer just says "Thanks!" after being praised for a line she didn't write, then it becomes very hard to construct her as doing anything other than deliberately setting out to deceive.

The whole plagiarism thing mystifies me. By this:

[T]o plagiarize is to give the impression that you wrote or thought something that you in fact borrowed from someone, and to do so is a violation of professional ethics.... Forms of plagiarism include the failure to give appropriate acknowledgment when repeating another's wording or particularly apt phrase, paraphrasing another's argument, and presenting another's line of thinking

I'm a plagiarist. I plagiarised arguments I read on

metafandom to make my vid Us. I plagiarise every time I draw a picture of a building I didn't build myself (which is every time!) or use a structure I never invented. I drew a picture an hour ago using the proportions of the body that my dad taught me, that he learnt, that in the end Da Vinci laid out. I'm not fucking citing Da Vinci, or my dad, for that matter. I quote lines from TV shows when I talk to my friends. A lot of the time I do it and I don't even know, because I never saw that particular show, or that book that they all had when they were kids and so I just know the references. I am swimming in a sea of other people's ideas. It's called culture! I can't cite the entire world. It's absurd.

I'm fine with it, actually. I don't care how hard someone worked on their art; they can shit it directly to the page for all I care, if it's good art. ;)

In these debates in fandom, plagiarism is always talked about in terms of universities and student papers, but this isn't school. I am not your student, the reader is not my lecturer, and their appreciation is not my passing (or failing) grade.

I'm happy to forgo praise to make my fanac, which is plagiarism, drawn as it is, largely uncited, from my interactions with the world, with bits and pieces that I find and cobble together. I mean...that's fine! Withhold your praise! Keep it! *grins*

I am swimming in a sea of other people's ideas. It's called culture! I can't cite the entire world. It's absurd.

I love this.

Yes, but you would never take a painting done by Da Vinci originally, if you were by some small chance able to come up with an original painting, slap some modern pant over the top of it in the same exact pattern and then call the painting wholly yours, would you?

A plagiarist is stealing another persons words, regurgitating it, and saying "it all, wholly, came outta my ass." That's not cool. Not cool at all.

There's a difference between copying art - in school we were taught to copy and emulate famous paintings in the hopes that we could grow our artistic abilities, just as in writing classes I have, we are taught to write in the style of famous authors. That's learning, stretching the creative juices and that IS culture.

Well.. yeah, I might. I don't know why I would but I'm not going to say I wouldn't ever do it. Not his actual painting, but a copy...but then of course I don't think you mean an original because all these hypothetical schoolkids aren't cutting up original manuscripts and sticking them in their copybooks.

but, yes, I completely did, as I said, I read debates on metafandom for a couple of years and then I regurgitated them. I used, frex, a couple hundred stock photographs in a vid I made, all cut up to make letters to spell out words. I never credited all those people who took those photographs, and they never credited the person that painted the signs that were their subjects, or their original designer... My point is that nothing comes wholly outta anyone's ass and that it's ridiculous to pretend it does.

And omg! For real I am tired of being told what y'all did at school. I don't care what rules you all made up there. Fandom is not an extension of bloody university.

But anyway, this is the crux though, isn't it. The issue here seems to be this idea of stealing credit, not making the art itself. So my solution is simple. I will continue to do exactly what I want, and if it upsets you, don't credit me. Take my art and use it uncredited! That's a revenge I can get behind, heh. I think that works well for everyone.

Ah but see, if someone were to take my photography (which I do sell) and try to edit it and claim it as theirs... well that is plagiarism, and you can bet your ass I will be calling my lawyer to contact them.

So go ahead and do what you’ve been doing. It may never have a causal affect on your life, and one day it might – you might take and regurgitate something that the original creator doesn’t want regurgitated elsewhere and end up in court.

"Failure" to credit != claim of ownership. Which is the entire point of the post, obviously.

I feel like you're just stating a position, like... oh, it's the plagiarism debate on metafandom, better roll out my Point Of View! Judy! Get my Point of View down from the back bedroom! *grins*

But anyway! Yeah, I might end up in court one day. But ending up in court doesn't always mean you've done something wrong, or even illegal. That's precisely what the court is there to determine.

take my photography (which I do sell) and try to edit it and claim it as theirs...well that is plagiarism

Jeff Koons, an appropriation artist, recently did just that (http://www.clancco.com/art_law/koons_wins_appeal_and_right_to_use_copyrighted_mat_1.html), and won his case (http://blogs.fairusenetwork.org/?p=12). So yes, I certainly could be sued, but that's not the same thing as being wrong.

It's my duty to evaluate my acts and their consequences to the world I inhabit. In this case, somewhat egotistically, I have decided that it is less harmful to make art (or really, more to the point, to live in a world where such art is allowed to exist) than to refrain from making art for fear of litigation.

I would be somewhat leery of attributing plagiarism to the duplication of plot elements. If we do that, we have to enshrine Shakespeare as the greatest plagiarist in the English language, since he only created one of the plots of his plays (The Tempest); even many of his historical plays were based on the plots of previous plays and stories about the characters. Hamlet is a prime example.

We also have to be very careful not to confuse plagiarism with copyright violation. One can easily violate copyright without committing plagiarism and vice versa.

(here from metafandom, hello.)

Interesting post. I think that the problem with comparing fiction online with Eliot and Pound (oh I really don't want to be burned at the stake here..) is that their audiences have different references. For example, Eliot references a line from Hamlet. Readers acknowledge line and it helps add another level to the poem in its allusion. Fic-writer references a line of dialogue/text from famous fandom: readers acknowledge line as belonging to something else and a nod to it. Not as familiar with Pound's work, I'd say of Eliot that the fact that his work has so many allusions makes it a multi-lateral read where the text can be read knowing (or not knowing) the allusions - almost as if we are not meant to catch all of them but be pleased with noticing the ones we do. That's why compendiums and guides are so important: so we can see whether the line we so loved should be attributed to Eliot were we to quote him. Another side to this is just how far the references go. My view of plagiarism is that it sticks to few (or one) key sources from which to steal/borrow.

I equate plagiarism with the nicking of passages (ie, more than a sentence) or plots from other books. I think the first is more of a problem, as if you believe some critics there is only a finite amount of plots anyway. The latter is far harder to discern whether to scorn or not though. It's also harder to detect, given the wide breadth of language [writer] could be hijacking.

To a degree, I agree with you. Pound's and Eliot's ideal audiences were much more arudite than even their actual audience (thus the need for compendia); I'm not sure fandom really needs to recreate quite their level of elitism. At the same time, my flist is quite familiar with Hamlet (several flisters have taught it!), and I'd feel comfortable utilizing pretty much any amount of it. (Passing off an entire scene as Buffy fanfiction would be too Dadaist for my tastes, but I don't see anything ethically wrong with it, since with that extent of borrowing, it'd be difficult for people not to notice what I was doing, even if they had only a passing familiarity with Shakespeare.) There are also certain key texts of our childhood--Dr. Seuss, Frances Hodgson Burnett, Beverly Clearly--that I'd expect at least a great deal of the American portion of my readership to be familiar with. But while I might steal from the Chronicles of Narnia, I don't think it would be as appropriate to do so from Lewis' space trilogy.

Ah Hamlet. I've just finished studying that, and now on to Milton. I think that Shakespeare references are fun, because when you recognise them it's lovely. My head is sifting through Hamlet trying to figure out a scene which would work within Buffy... I'm sure the gravedigger scene might work between LateSeason Buffy and perhaps Spike or Giles. Hmm.

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A Prescriptivist Take on Plagiarism

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