Quality academic writing is built upon the work of others, to which we add our own unique analysis and contributions. Citation allows us to acknowledge how the scholarship of others has contributed to our own work, to distinguish for our readers which ideas are our own and which are borrowed, and to give our readers a path by which they can trace the intellectual development of the ideas we present. To fail to distinguish our original ideas from those of our forebears is plagiarism, "the act of appropriating the literary composition of another author, or excerpts, ideas, or passages therefrom, and passing the material off as one's own creation." (West's Encyclopedia of American Law)

After completing this section you will know:

• The intellectual and ethical rationales for citing the work of others
• What types of information must be cited and what types of information need not
• How to avoid plagiarism