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The death of Jason Arday, the former Professor of Sociology of Education at the University of Cambridge, has provoked considerable debate in the UK and beyond regarding alleged racism in the media, ‘DEI’ (Diversity, Equality and Inclusion), and academic misconduct more generally.
In July, Nathan Cofnas accused Jason Arday of significant plagiarism in his PhD thesis and in a number of published papers. Within a matter of days, the story had been picked up by the mainstream press and went on to dominate the news cycle; Arday resigned his post on 5 August and was found dead in his home on 14 August.
So, what is plagiarism?
A common definition is provided by the American Historical Association (AHA): it is “the appropriation of ‘the exact wording of another author without attribution’, and the borrowing of ‘distinctive and significant research findings or interpretations’”. Further, the AHA “considers plagiarism to be the failure to properly acknowledge the work of another, regardless of intent”.
Cofnas was not the first person to make the allegations against Jason Arday. The Times Higher Education had investigated the story for some time and elected not to publish an article “following correspondence with Arday’s solicitors”.
Liverpool John Moores University (LJMU), where Arday completed his PhD research, had investigated claims about his doctoral thesis. Yet, despite the presence of uncited verbatim material which was not presented in quotation marks, the investigation did not uphold the allegations of plagiarism. Given the definition above, how could this be?
The truth is that there is no single, agreed definition of plagiarism.
As noted, the AHA considers the act of reproducing material or ideas without proper acknowledgement of the source to be plagiarism, regardless of intent. However, if we look at other definitions, the waters begin to muddy.
The Collins Dictionary defines the word as “the practice of using or copying someone else’s idea or work and pretending that you thought of it or created it”. The Cambridge Dictionary definition is near identical – “the process or practice of using another person’s ideas or work and pretending that it is your own”. As is the Oxford English Dictionary’s – “the action or practice of taking someone else’s work, idea, etc., and passing it off as one’s own; literary theft”.
Each of these definitions includes some form of intent, the verb ‘pretend’, and verbal phrase ‘to pass off’ being critical caveats to the definition. This is because the word comes from, to quote the Oxford English Dictionary, “classical Latin plagium [for] kidnapping”. The first use of the word in the context of literary theft comes from the 1st Century AD Roman poet Martial’s Epigrams when he accused other poets of stealing his verses.
So, with this context in mind, plagiarism has been historically associated with theft; a deliberate act of misappropriation. Yet, for many writers, academics, and institutions, intent has become less important than the result. As the AHA legitimately points out, allowing for a definition of plagiarism that includes intent offers “easy absolution for sloppy work and convenient cover for plagiarists, since intent to deceive is often impossible to prove”.
This view, however, is not universally shared, and intent or lack thereof remains key for some. The Royal Society places plagiarism under the umbrella of “research misconduct” that “includes fabrication, falsification, or plagiarism in proposing, performing, or reviewing research, or in reporting research results”. Significantly, “research misconduct does not include honest error or differences of opinion”.
Thus, both the exact way in which one interprets the word, and the intellectual environment where disputes are adjudicated, might alter the outcome of an alleged plagiarism offence, even if the fact that text or ideas have been lifted without proper attribution is undisputed.
Universities in the UK (and worldwide) have to grapple with the problem of academic misconduct and draw up rules and guidance for students and academics accordingly. LJMU’s Academic Misconduct Policy defines academic misconduct as “all deliberate attempt(s) to gain an unfair advantage in assessments. This includes cheating, plagiarism, unauthorised collusion, cheating in an examination or any other deliberate attempt to gain an unfair advantage in summatively assessed work”. Note the specific caveat that the conduct must be “deliberate”.
In the Arday case, the investigation cleared him of plagiarism. As reported in Byline Times, the university “inquiry found citation defects but did not uphold plagiarism, concluding that the problems were caused by ‘honest and reasonable error’, compounded by inadequate supervision regarding Arday’s learning disabilities”.
While other institutions may not consider intent when determining if plagiarism has been committed, as is their right, LJMU does. Academic conduct panels must adjudicate the evidence of the allegations before them, based on the rules and definitions of their institution.
This is why Jason Arday was cleared of committing plagiarism in his doctoral thesis: under the rules and regulations of his university, he did not.
Dr Chris Smith is a writer and historian