Plagiarism! What to do when plagiarist copied your work?

Cite this article as: Eden, S. W. (2020). Plagiarism! What to do when plagiarist copied your work?. Retrieved from https://sw-eden.net/2020/01/01/plagiarism/

I am afraid of the dark power. The power that makes me uncertain. The power that I do not know. I have seen its effect on others before. It was too much for me to be in the game. I know only I am now playing with fire.

The policy of my university was that each core course should have its own book or publication for the students to read. Therefore, almost all of the lecturers were invited to write one or more chapters. I wrote a chapter of the book for the course, Art for Communication. It is the chapter 10.

After that, a senior lecturer made his own version of this book. He copied a part of my work (about 4 pages with his font setting). Although he gave (wrong) citations, almost all of the content in that part is plagiarism. Later, I knew from him that he sent the particular book to apply to be an assistant professor. This should not have happened. The plagiarism should not have been in that book.

I asked him to take his book back from the process, and resend it again without plagiarism. He told me that he could not do it. He believes that it is not a wrong thing to exactly copy others’ work as long as he cites them in the reference part. In fact, paraphrasing is needed. We all could not copy anything more than 3 lines, even we cite it. If the literature is more than three lines, we have to format it with a big indent and italic font format.

I tried to tell him that he did not do it correctly, and he should have retrieved his book back before the committees saw it. However, he said that it was normal to copy others’ work this way. I am disappointed, and I am afraid that he would let his book go through the process.

I am just a small young university lecturer. I think I may get a big problem now, after I claim my right and justice. There might be some power that I could not see, but it might hurt me after this.

If I did not do a right thing as what I have done, I would not forgive myself for the whole life. However, when I do the right thing and look for the justice, I become afraid of the power of someone with a higher position in my university.

I write this today, in case, there might be something happen to me. Then, we all know it. Thank you everyone that spent your time listening to my anxiety.