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Is It Plagiarism?

By: Phil Scriver, LC200 Historian

Did he write it or merely copy another writer? This question has been the topic of several newspaper articles lately that have been concerned with the controversy over plagiarism. The problem exists at all levels from high school English classes to the professional writers. Almost anyone who puts words on paper borrows phrases or short passages from the works of others. Consequently the potential for plagiarism is a real and never-ending issue. Fortunately, as soon as a child starts learning to write this issue is discussed and the proper way to deal with it is presented. Many high school and college papers which are otherwise high caliber work end up in the trash for want of properly crediting borrowed material. The dreaded footnote strikes again!

Recently author Stephen Ambrose has been publicly questioned about the origins of several passages in six of his books. Other authors and readers have said Ambrose did not write the passages in question. He simply copied them from elsewhere. They stop just short of openly accusing him of plagiarism.

A few comments by history professors shed some light. One professor simply says it would be unacceptable for one of her students to footnote and borrow as Ambrose did. Another professor says Ambrose was focused on something else (other than scholastic footnoting). Yet another professor says Ambrose has fallen into a trap of using too much from other historians for the sake of speed. (However, even if he copied 500 words from others in a 500 page book that is a very small amount.) Several other historians concluded the issue was what frequently happens with his style of writing popular history concentrating on storytelling rather than critical interpretation of history.

Bear in mind these critical remarks all come from academia. Although these history professors may have written books, none of them have even come close to reaching the readership Stephen Ambrose has. One of the big reasons is the writing style each used. The fact is that writing within academia is not the kind of reading most people want. Ambrose’s style is what attracts readers.

Let’s spend some time and review Ambrose’s footnoting techniques. In school we are taught the material quoted (copied) is to be enclosed in quotation marks then the passage is numbered with a superscript number. At the bottom of the page the author, publication and page number information is given. A number of variations on this basic method have become acceptable over the years, depending upon the type writing being done. The farther away from the formal research paper the writing gets, the more informal the footnote. Going back and examining Ambrose’s footnotes we see he does not use the basic formal method. He uses endnotes at the end of each chapter.

By his own admission Ambrose is not writing to produce scholarly research work. He is writing to tell a story using solid factual history for his base. He is writing to the reader who has a more casual knowledge and interest in history, which is most of us. Consequently the power of his storytelling must hold the reader’s interest and learning the history is a byproduct. His techniques must be vastly different from the scholar who is arranging a set of facts in an orderly manner without much regard for the size of his readership. One of these differences is that he uses a great amount of oral history. (In his book about D-Day, the majority of the references are oral rather than written documents.) As a result many quotes are found in his text. An example would be: Sgt Thompson said, “They were so close we could hear them breathing.” He leaves quotation marks out of the text for his other footnoted material. As a result his footnotes that are for material directly quoted from another author looks like a footnote for general information or a concept that he is giving credit to someone else for (here is the very center of the controversy about him borrowing what others have written). Example: In the text he would write—War is hell because on the front line there is no way to call time out when things aren’t going the way they were planned. Then the footnote would credit the author, publication, etc. Notice the text does not have any quote marks. We do not really know if these words were taken from the work cited or the concept.

So the criticism of Ambrose’s borrowing comes down to the use of quotation marks. It looks to me like he uses quotation marks to show conversation. In showing borrowed text or concepts he leaves off the quotation marks to distinguish it from the conversation. However, he does mark the footnote giving author, publication, etc.

I can not believe he has done anything wrong. He adequately credits his sources and works to minimize confusing the reader. He uses a style that gets the readers attention and doesn’t make him stumble over academic rules of style. End of discussion.

If we want to get into a discussion of mechanics how about looking at the misspelled words, misplaced modifiers, verb tense and agreement or sentence structure?

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