Critique on Extended Analysis by Rachel De Leon, Colleen Harrison, Mary White, and Jill Elberson Murphy

 http://www.faculty.english.ttu.edu/rice/5060/plagiarism-podcast.mp3

I wasn't expecting a podcast, since the version of the analysis you all chose said to do a video about plagiarism. But I liked how the four of you managed to each have your own discussions of types of plagiarism well within 15-20 minutes, which kept the whole podcast going at a huge pace. There was no snazzy intro or any incidental music or audio editing, but only a round table of you four talking about types of plagiarism and how to avoid them. The fact that you just jumped into the subject material showed me how well you could start the discussion without really digressing beforehand. The audio quality also had a low resolution to it, but it still sounded fine to me. In my opinion, the subject material of a podcast really matters more than enhanced editing software or NPR-style interludes. The project had a bluntness to it that worked in favor of its argument, despite some awkward beats that don't really detract too much from the whole production. The podcast was well constructed with each argument too, because it felt like each one of you could give an argument without stepping on someone's toes. The topic of plagiarism, especially the non-intentional plagiarism you talked about in the beginning, is a deep and complex one. I could understand why paraphrasing something could cause some form of plagiarism, especially when all that student does is copy a quote and use a thesaurus to replace some words with different-sounding words. Yet that's not just plagiarism to me, but laziness too. All plagiarism could come from some sort of laziness stemming from not wanting to put effort into a project and instead copying other papers without looking at what those papers are talking about.

            The points you brought up on plagiarism, and ways to handle them, helped your podcast appeal to a broad audience because you all used personal experiences as students that student listeners could relate to. If any of you were to play this podcast to a class of students, then they would eventually hear these learning experiences and come to an understanding with either of you. If Mary played this podcast for her class and they got to the beginning where she talks about getting marks for not citing a paraphrase before going to college, they’d not only learn about how paraphrasing without citations is plagiarism, but they’d learn that Mary has been through the same road that they have been in. By talking about personal experiences and opinions with plagiarism, the podcast gains the ethos needed for a project that's meant to get a complex topic like plagiarism across to students. The discussions explaining how derivative works like fan fiction can avoid plagiarism if they do not follow the story down to the smallest detail and create an alternate universe or story informed me of an aspect of plagiarism vs. inspiration that I had little to no awareness. The discussion of how parody is legal instead of satire due to its following of the source material without raising satirical points even opened my eyes to how parody gets away with copying the material when something like "The Wind Done Gone" is a more serious novel that got in trouble for using Margaret Mitchell's characters without the estate's permission. The dense research on different types of plagiarism helped this podcast's credibility the most as a result of these discussions of how fan fiction and parody can fit with plagiarism. Your displays of knowledge on the topic further supported your chemistry and presentation within this podcast, making the whole thing a balanced and enjoyable listen.