Paraphrasing versus Patchwriting

You copy a short passage from an article you found.
You change a couple of words, so that it's different than the original.
You carefully cite the source.

= PLAGIARISM

MS image - highlighter on book-400.png In the scenario above, even though you have acknowledged the source of the ideas with a citation, you have still committed plagiarism. The reason is that the new passage is too close to the original text. This form of plagiarism is called patchwriting.

Patchwriting occurs when a student paraphrases a passage but leaves it too similar to the original. In patchwriting, the writer may delete a few words, change the order, substitute synonyms and even change the grammatical structure, but the reliance on the original text is still visible when the two are compared.

Paraphrasing vs. Patchwriting: Example

Read the following passage about wrestling. Note the differences between the paraphrasing and patchwriting examples.

Atkinson, M. (2002). Fifty million viewers can’t be wrong: Professional wrestling, sports-entertainment, and mimesis. Sociology of Sport Journal, 9, 47-66.

Original passage:

“Where mainstream sports typically refrain from displaying unapologetically violent acts, professional wrestling dives in head first. A large portion of wrestling’s cultural appeal is generated by the psychological arousal/excitement provided by witnessing highly aggressive and violent forms of physical interaction in this sphere. Wrestling takes that which is pushed behind the scenes of social life and places it in the center ring” (Atkinson, 2002, p. 62-63).

Acceptable Paraphrase:

Most sports do not encourage blatant acts of violence, while professional wrestling embraces the same behaviour. Wrestling appeals to audiences because people enjoy watching aggressive and violent acts in the ring. What is normally not condoned in ordinary society is made acceptable in wrestling. (Atkinson, 2002, p. 62-63)

This is an acceptable paraphrase. Notice that the ideas of the original are included, yet they are stated in different words than the original. Next, note the difference between the acceptable paraphrase example above and the patchwriting example below.

Original passage:

“Where mainstream sports typically refrain from displaying unapologetically violent acts, professional wrestling dives in head first. A large portion of wrestling’s cultural appeal is generated by the psychological arousal/excitement provided by witnessing highly aggressive and violent forms of physical interaction in this sphere. Wrestling takes that which is pushed behind the scenes of social life and places it in the center ring” (Atkinson, 2002, p. 62-63).

Patchwriting:

Mainstream sports refrain from showing unremorseful violent acts while professional wrestling unapologetically revels in the same type of violence. A large part of wrestling’s appeal is generated by the very aggressive and violent interaction in this sport. While such violence is usually behind the scenes of social life, it is the centre of wrestling’s existence. (Atkinson, 2002, p. 62-63)

In the patchwriting example, a few words have been changed here and there, but not enough has been done to make the attempted paraphrase different from the original. The blue text identifies words and phrases which occur in both the original and the attempted paraphrase.

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