Knowledge incorporated: plagiarism and anti-plagiarism therapies in higher education

In this dissertation, I examine the ways in which literary historians, educators, legal scholars, and composition theorists have characterized plagiarism as a problem in higher education. I analyze twentieth-century plagiarism detection and prevention strategies, including Web-based plagiarism detection services, as particular attempts to solve the plagiarism problem. Throughout, I define plagiarism in the contexts of post-secondary education, intellectual property law, literary convention, and computer technology and technique. I use communication theory to situate plagiarism as both an individual writing and reading activity and a cultural production activity. I argue that Web-based plagiarism detection services regulate writing and reading practices in ways consistent with pre-computer, even pre-industrial, efforts to manage and refine human behavior. I also demonstrate that plagiarism detection services, under the aegis of pedagogical reform, remedy and remediate errant information flows while teaching the prevailing lessons of modern authorship and intellectual property. I propose in conclusion that the cultural value of plagiarism detection lies not only in the anti-plagiarism remedies themselves but also in the ways such remedies inscribe and reinscribe modern authoring techniques in the age of computer-based communication.