Reading chapter 7 of Why White Rice? I thought “Oh man, another thing on citing sources.” And while it was that, I thought it was put in an interesting and thoughtful manner. When writing a paper one does not usually think about why they should not plagiarize someone else’s work, just that it is necessary to not get in trouble. When the thought of integrity and trust comes in it’s a completely different story. When someone puts an idea out in the open for anyone to see or use they are taking a certain level of risk. After they’ve put it out there anyone could cite it as their own and take massive amounts of credit for it. This is what makes copyright laws so necessary, sure they may seem a bit harsh at times but if you come at it from another point of view they are understandable. The artist, writer, songwriter, etc. puts enough trust in the public that they hope their idea won’t be taken for granted. At the point that this contract of trust is broken the offender has a price to pay. This is relevant to our college careers because not only have our source’s placed trust in us not to plagiarize, but so have our instructors and the college where we attend.

Swanson, Troy “Mash It Up…Gracefully Using Sources” Why White Rice? Thinking Through Writing, Kendall Hunt 2010