Copyright and Plagiarism Information

(Keeping It Legal! Keeping It Honest!)

Works created by another person, whether you know who it is or not, remain the property of that person. It is not ok to use a photograph, song, video, book or other intellectual creation of someone else without following Guidelines for “Fair Use” (otherwise, it’s the same as stealing, which is illegal!). For school assignments, general Fair Use Guidelines include

• use for a specific non-profit educational assignment

• citing and crediting all sources of information, sound and images

• small quantity of the whole work used (1 or 2 photos from a website, short clip of video

or music, a quote from a poem rather than the entire poem)

• limited copies (you can’t burn 10 DVDs for your friends and relatives)

• limited distribution (keep it in the classroom; you can’t put your Power Point or movie

on the Web or enter it in a contest w/o getting permission from ALL sources)

Whenever you use another person’s idea, words or creative work (drawing, music, blueprint), you must note that it’s not your original work, and give credit to that person. If you don’t, you are implying that you thought up the idea, wrote the music or took the picture yourself, and that’s plagiarism.

To avoid plagiarism, make sure you follow these steps:

• on all your notes, include the bibliographic information for your source.

• include a bibliography (which means “list of books”) or “Works Cited” page, or run

credits at the end of a movie or sound production.

• copy the URL for every single thing you use from the Internet (in addition to other

bibliographic information for the source)

• if you use a specific idea, a quote, photo or a sound or movie clip, indicate exactly where

you found that information (the URL, the book and page number, the CD and song)

Citing Your Sources

(Giving Credit Where Credit Is Due)

You will need to keep track of ALL of your information sources (whether from books, magazines, Internet databases or websites). If you use a specific piece of information (an opinion or quote, a sound or video clip, a picture), you need to note exactly where you found the information AND give credit to its creator. These credits are usually a separate list from the bibliography, either at the bottom of each page (footnotes) or all on one page at the end (endnotes) of your work.

How to create a bibliography

The sources in your bibliography should be listed alphabetically according to the first word of the citation (may be the author’s last name, or the title of the source if no author is found). Citations should not be numbered. The second and following lines of a citation should be indented. Titles should be either underlined or in italics, but not both. Technically, all entries should be double-spaced, but ask your teachers what they prefer.

Examples - Print Sources

Book with one author

Haskins, James. African American Entrepreneurs. New York: J. Wiley & Sons, 1998.

Book with two or more authors

McKissack, Patricia C., and Frederick L. McKissack. Young, Black and Determined:

A Biography of Lorraine Hansberry. New York: Holiday House, 1998.

Encyclopedia or other Reference Book Article (some encyclopedias have signed articles,

look for an author’s name at the beginning or end of the article. If no author

listed, the title of the article comes first)

Arnold, James D. “Plantation.” The World Book Encyclopedia. 2002 ed.

Robinson, Greg. “Harlem Globetrotters.” Encyclopedia of African-American Culture

and History. Ed. Jack Salzman, David Lionel Smith, and Cornel West. New York:

Tipaldi, Art. “Big City Blues: Where It’s At.” Footsteps: African American Heritage.

September/October 2005: 32-34.

Examples - Digital Sources

Author(s). Name of Page. Date of Posting/Revision. Date of Access. <URL/electronic address>.

Newspaper or Magazine article from an Internet database (like ProQuest or SIRS)

Huffstutter, P.J. "A Time for Respect and Rededication: Rosa Parks' funeral draws

the famous and the unknown, united in appreciation and a belief that the struggle

for civil rights is unfinished.” Los Angeles Times [Los Angeles, Calif.]

3 Nov. 2005, A.10. ProQuest. Paideia School Library, Atlanta, Georgia.

13 Feb. 2006 <http://www.proquest.com/>

Martin Luther King: “I Have a Dream.” DVD. 1963. MPI Home Video, 2005.

Song from a Music CD

King, B. B. “Every Day I Have the Blues.” Rec. 1964. B.B. King: Greatest Hits. MCA, 1998.

Website (the whole thing)

Encyclopedia Britannica’s Guide to Black History. 2005. Encyclopedia Britannica.

13 February 2006. <http://http://school.eb.com/Blackhistory/home.do/>

One Page from a Website

"ERA in Action". Not For Ourselves Alone: The Story of Elizabeth Cady Stanton

and Susan B. Anthony. Undated. September 10, 2007. <http://www.pbs.org/stantonanthony/>.

Sound Clip from a Website

Brown, James and Rufus Bland. “Leadin’ Me On.” July 1940. Florida Folklife from the WPA

Collection. 2000. American Memory. Lib.of Congress, Washington. 13 February

2006. <http://memory.loc.gov/afc/afcflwpa/389/3899b1.mp3>

A photograph from the Internet

Shahn, Ben. “Sharecroppers.” Oct. 1935. A Photo Dossier on Sharecropping. Modern

American Poetry. 1999-2002. Department of English, University of Illinois at

Urbana-Champaign. 13 February 2006. <http://www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/

poets/a_f/brown/images/share3.jpg>

A Video Clip from a Website

“Program Tries to Ease Friction Between African Americans and Jews.” 1995. CNN.com.

13 February 2006. <http://images.cnn.com/US/9511/blacks_and_jews/history.mov>

Example of a finished bibliography