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Journalism professor ousted as columnist for plagiarism
AP via SFGate ^ | 11/12/7 | unattributed

Posted on 11/12/2007 10:18:43 AM PST by SmithL

Columbia, Mo. (AP) -- A distinguished University of Missouri-Columbia journalism professor will no longer write a weekly newspaper column after admitting to plagiarizing material from a student reporter.

John Merrill, a professor emeritus at the University of Missouri School of Journalism, also wrote a Sunday column for the Columbia Missourian, a community newspaper affiliated with the school.

But a Nov. 4 column by Merrill about the university's women's and gender studies program used three quotes and other phrases taken directly from an Oct. 5 story in The Maneater, an independent student newspaper.

Missourian Executive Editor Tom Warhover disclosed the plagiarism in his own column Sunday. A review of Merrill's earlier work by Missourian editors found five more columns in which at least one quote had been taken from other publications without attribution, Warhover wrote.

"Missourian policy does not allow any writer to appropriate someone else's words as his own, even when those words are within quotation marks," he said.

While Warhover said that several colleagues he consulted described Merrill's transgression as "the ethical equivalent of a misdemeanor, not a felony,"

(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; US: Missouri
KEYWORDS: academia; highereducation; journalism; missouri; plagerism; plagiarism
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1 posted on 11/12/2007 10:18:44 AM PST by SmithL
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To: abb

hmmmmmmmmm


2 posted on 11/12/2007 10:19:18 AM PST by SmithL (I don't do Barf Alerts, you're old enough to read and decide for yourself)
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To: SmithL

Another liberal?


3 posted on 11/12/2007 10:23:57 AM PST by nmh (Intelligent people recognize Intelligent Design (God) .)
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To: SmithL
Professor of Journalism, hmmmmmmmmmm.

How long has this plagiarist been teaching his "craft?"

Presumably, he allowed his students to appropriate the work of others, since he himself has no problem doing it.

I suppose that we can rest assured that many of his ilk are also teaching at other academic institutions.

4 posted on 11/12/2007 10:24:50 AM PST by zerosix (Native Sunflower)
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To: SmithL

Had a Student done such an act, he would be summarily expelled from University. The same “Courtesy” should be accorded to the Professor.


5 posted on 11/12/2007 10:25:50 AM PST by SandRat (Duty, Honor, Country. What else needs to be said?)
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To: SmithL

He can always get a job at the New York Times.


6 posted on 11/12/2007 10:25:59 AM PST by Man50D (Fair Tax, you earn it, you keep it! Duncan Hunter is a Cosponsor.)
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To: SmithL

Snicker.


7 posted on 11/12/2007 10:27:55 AM PST by Greg F (Duncan Hunter is a good man.)
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To: SmithL
"...column by Merrill about the university's women's and gender studies program used three quotes and other phrases taken directly from an Oct. 5 story in The Maneater."

yuck.
8 posted on 11/12/2007 10:29:02 AM PST by Liberty Valance (Keep a simple manner for a happy life :o)
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To: SmithL

Source: Columbian Missourian (lest I be accused of plagiarism)

9 posted on 11/12/2007 10:29:44 AM PST by martin_fierro (< |:)~)
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To: SmithL

Well this is kinda funny, since I know college profs. who have outside contract work that they assign to their students as “ Assignments “then edit the work for themselves turning it to their clients and get paid.


10 posted on 11/12/2007 10:40:22 AM PST by Walkingfeather (u)
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To: SmithL
A distinguished University of Missouri-Columbia journalism professor will no longer write a weekly newspaper column after admitting to plagiarizing material from a student reporter.

Apparently, someone doesn't understand something. Ethics, morals, laws, policies, etc., don't apply to liberals. Those things only apply to conservatives. With liberals, the policy is "Do as I say, NOT as I do"!

11 posted on 11/12/2007 10:51:54 AM PST by DustyMoment (FloriDUH - proud inventors of pregnant/hanging chads and judicide!!)
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To: rface

Local interest story ping


12 posted on 11/12/2007 10:53:37 AM PST by VOA
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To: Temple Owl

ping


13 posted on 11/12/2007 11:00:52 AM PST by Tribune7 (Dems want to rob from the poor to give to the rich)
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To: SmithL

As I have always maintained and consider to be both true and original, A house divided, cannot stand.


14 posted on 11/12/2007 11:11:45 AM PST by Old Professer (The critic writes with rapier pen, dips it twice, and writes again.)
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To: SmithL
"Missourian policy does not allow any writer to appropriate someone else's words as his own, even when those words are within quotation marks,"

huh?

That sentence doesn't make sense. If quotation marks are used then the writer is not claiming the words to be his own.

15 posted on 11/12/2007 11:29:45 AM PST by antinomian (Show me a robber baron and I'll show you a pocket full of senators.)
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To: SmithL

What a slick way for an aging writer to get himself hired by the New York Times....


16 posted on 11/12/2007 11:30:44 AM PST by tracer
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To: zerosix
This is a pretty common problem. My father had a research partner call him one night, a decade after he had completed his doctorate. Evidently, one of the professors on my father's doctoral board had plagiarized a bunch of material out of Dad's thesis.

Nothing was done to the academic criminal.

17 posted on 11/12/2007 11:33:12 AM PST by USNBandit (sarcasm engaged at all times)
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To: Walkingfeather

I had a history teacher who had his students do all the reaserch for a book he was writing this way. I waited years for his book to come out so I could sue his ass, but I guess he never got it published.


18 posted on 11/12/2007 11:33:50 AM PST by ozzymandus
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To: ozzymandus
I was a lowly undergraduate when, at the professor's prompting, I took on a paper on the Bonus Marchers. That 12 page paper later became the blueprint for this professor's book, and I was never thanked either personally or in print. I'm still not sure what a professor's responsibilities are toward attributing his work from student papers.

The book is at:
http://www.questia.com/PM.qst?a=o&d=27284502#
19 posted on 11/12/2007 12:03:27 PM PST by jobim
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To: SmithL

No surprise, as according to the headline, he was already a “columnist for plagiarism”.


20 posted on 11/12/2007 12:56:49 PM PST by kenavi (Save romance. Stop teen sex.)
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