Exploring the Issue of Plagiarism through Kaavya Viswanathan’s Novel Opal Mehta

by Joanna Johnson

Objectives

By the end of this exercise/module, students will be better able to:

1. Understand the concept of ownership of words and ideas
2. Understand the concept of integrity in relation to the written word
3. Understand the concept of appropriate acknowledgement of others' words and ideas
4. Understand questions of ownership of intellectual property
5. Understand what constitutes plagiarism in a commercial and an academic setting in Western culture
6. Know where to find out how to attribute sources correctly