Global Utilities

La Trobe University
Language and Academic Skills (ESL)

Acknowledgment, Referencing and Plagiarism

Acknowledging other people's work in your writing

In some assignments it may be enough to use your own experiences, impression and responses. However for most of the writing you'll do at university you'll need to refer to the ideas, writings, and research of other people. This involves finding relevant materials, evaluating the ideas, and acknowledging the sources of this information.

Acknowledgment and references

You use references to acknowledge other people's work, ideas, words and formulae. The reasons for referencing include showing:

  • where you obtained the information
  • there is a reliable source for the information
  • you have read widely
  • you have sourced appropriately
  • the sort of knowledge you were using to support your views
  • that there may be different perceptions on the one topic
  • and that you recognise another person's efforts.

For more information

Acknowledgment conventions in Australian universities can differ from the accepted ways of using other people's work in other countries and cultures. It is important to learn the rules for how to reference and how to use quotes in Australian universities.

Using quotes/quotations

When you copy the words from an author you are quoting their work.

  • Direct Quotes - copying exactly what someone else has said or written. The quotation will either be in "quotation marks" if short (ie. less than three lines), or if longer than 3 lines, will be indented and sometimes it is even put in a different font. See the relevant style guide for more information about this.
  • Indirect quotes - taking someone else's ideas or work and rewriting it into your own words or shortening / summarising it, also known as paraphrasing and/or summarising.
  • For BOTH direct and indirect quotes you MUST acknowledge where you sourced the ideas. In other words you need to cite the author and publication details using the referencing (documentation) style required by your Faculty, School or unit. 

For more information

Referencing styles

There are several ways of presenting your references. This may vary between Faculties, Schools or even between units within one School. You have probably been given information about how to reference and which referencing style to use in each unit guide or student work book.

Check which referencing style is required in each unit, and make sure you know how to reference using that style. Follow that style carefully and consistently for all work you submit.

Referencing styles can be divided into two main categories:

Author-date systems - include both the author name and date in the text

Numerical systems - use a number in the text to refer to a source

Other referencing sites

Referencing from the internet and electronic sources

Plagiarism

If you copy another's work without acknowledgment you could be accused of plagiarism.

Unaccceptable practices which could be defined as plagiarism include:

  • not clearly acknowledging the sources of where you got your information - not using in-text references or footnotes, and/or not including a reference list/bibliography;
  • using somebody else's words and pretending they are your own. The words might come from a published source (website, book, journal, etc) or they might come from another student's work;
  • copying sections of text without using quotation marks or otherwise indicating they are direct quotes;
  • paraphrasing sections of text but only making minimal changes (e.g. by using 1 or 2 synonyms), and not giving the source of the text.

There are more definitions of plagiarism in the La Trobe University Academic Misconduct Policy.

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