Tuesday, March 2, 2010
Christmas is in 298 days!
As a history teaching major, I have realized that we owe everything that we know about the past to historians that have come before. When writing a scholarly paper, historians compile something called a historiography. A historiography is a summary of what past scholars have said about a certain topic. This shows that as historians, we respect the opinions and insights that others have been able to give and we build on what they have said before, adding our own insights and personal views. This is just one example of how important it is to give credit to those that have done significant work before us. This is why plagiarism is such an issue. By taking someone else’s work and calling it your own, you are taking away all the credit that they should be getting for countless hours of work. As writers, we have a responsibility to report our opinions and as much of the truth as we know. Whatever we write should be either our own thoughts or the thoughts of others, with proper citation.
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After taking my History 200 class I really gained an appreciation for historiography. Call me sentimental, sappy, jaded, or whatever you want but without the work of others you would never be able to write a research based paper at all. So in a way, by not plagiarizing you are in effect saying "thank you" to everybody who has dedicated their lives to research just so we can understand topics and then write about them.
ReplyDeleteWell said. I really like the emotion you put into your presentation. It really does make a difference when you think of all the time people before us have spent on their research and writing. Also I like how you talk about it being our responsibility.
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments! Just like you Aaron, I've been through a History 200 class (actually I'm currently in it) and I just finished my first historiography last week. It was interesting to see all the work that people had put into their research and then to be able to compile all of that into something new.
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