Pragmatic Plagiarism: Authorship, Profit, and Power

M. Wayne Cunningham is a past executive director of the Saskatchewan
Arts Board and the former director of Academic and Career Programs at
East Kootenay Community College.

“Why do some instances of literary repetition become plagiarism, and
others become great art?” This is one of the questions Marilyn
Randall, associate professor in the Department of French at the
University of Western Ontario, tackles in her scholarly discourse on the
“slippery subject” of plagiarism. “[T]he single most difficult
challenge in attempting to write a book about plagiarism,” she says,
“is to avoid committing it.”

The book begins with an extended definition of plagiarism as the basis
for understanding concepts and analysis presented in the three major
sections that follow (“Authoring Plagiarism,” “Reading
Plagiarism,” and “Power Plagiarism”). Part 3 contains intriguing
chapters on the relationship of plagiarism to profit, the historical
development of plagiarism, and plagiarism “as a strategy of
subversion.”

Randall provides numerous examples of plagiarism through the ages. She
discusses copyright, appropriation, intellectual property, and modern
technology as issues to be grappled with in debates about the
“slippery subject.” Throughout the book, she emphasizes “the role
of plagiarist as cultural function.”

Undergraduates, graduates, and postgraduates should read this
well-written, informative, and meticulously documented work.