Primrose Road

The author of the Conversations with God series, who not only claims to have conversed with God and encourages others to do the same but also hawks retreats and "life skills" courses via his website, has been accused of plagiarism. Apparently, the Christmas essay that he posted on BeliefNet was lifted from a story published in "Chicken Soup for the Christian Family Soul" over eight years ago.

What I find especially amusing is that author Neale Donald Walsch tried to defend himself with exactly the same excuse that I've heard from a handful of not-so-critical-thinkers in my courses: he claims to have mistakenly believed that the tale of a child's Christmas pageant was his own because he was so familiar with it. This would have been a fine excuse if Walsch hadn't copied the story word-for-word:

Except for a different first paragraph in which Mr. Walsch wrote that he could “vividly remember” the incident, his Dec. 28 Beliefnet post followed, virtually verbatim, Ms. Chand’s previously published writing, even down to prosaic details like “The morning of the dress rehearsal, I filed in ten minutes early, found a spot on the cafeteria floor and sat down.”

As I tell my students: if you copy someone else's text word-for-word, there is absolutely no excuse short of demonstrable psychic ability that I'll buy.

5 percent of visitors to Primrose Road in December got here via a search for "plagiarizing hilarious," which makes me think I should start a blog called "Hilarious Plagiarism" in which secondary school and college-level teachers share the most hilarious instances of plagiarism they've ever encountered.

Though I think there already is a site for that. Hmm.

Bing of Happy Jihad's House of Pancakes tells a story that may indeed sum up everything you need to know.

After grading a stack of research papers written for a 200-level class, I have compiled a list of crucial talking points to address with the 100-level research paper writing class I'll be teaching next term:

1) If you can Google it, so can I. The only thing worse than plagiarism is lazy plagiarism (i.e. copy-and-paste plagiarism).

2) Inserting, um, "statistically improbable phrases" at random points in your paper as if to test whether or not your teacher actually reads the paper all the way through will not get you into said teacher's good graces.

3) Essay mills don't lend themselves to specific, original research paper assignments.

4) Essay mill essays are not considered credible scholarly articles.

5) A works cited list should not consist merely of a list of websites you visited the week before the paper was due.

6) "Peer-reviewed" does not mean "I asked my best friend if this was a credible source and she said yes."

7) If you can Google it, so can I.