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WHAT IS ORIGINALITY?
What Is Originality.mp3I was of the opinion that ideas originate in an individual’s mind and have no connection to the individual’s surroundings. It took one course to burst that bubble! I have since come to question that if all creations happen in social collaboration, is originality a myth?
According to Mark Twain, the answer to that question is, yes.
“Twain believed that there was no such thing as an original thought or an original idea, because every subject on Earth had been pored over, written about and analyzed” (Popova, 2015, para. 4).
Conley (2017) argues that while “Twain’s argument falls in line with the idea of intertextuality... Originality exists in a writer's style, perspective of his or her audience, and presentation of the work through chosen structure and organization. Style, audience, and structure all require that crucial decisions be made by the individual writer during the writing process, allowing a writer’s compositional and rhetorical choices to lend themselves to the creation of an authentic work” (p. 5-6).
How does originality apply to academic writing?
Therefore, while our ideas may not be completely original, the result of our unique style of copying, combining and transforming others’ work produces something new--just remember to cite the sources!
Sorry, Mark Twain!
(Kesh, 2018)
Artist and Youtuber, Kesh, talks about "how to steal like an artist"
And the difference between "good theft" and "bad theft".
(Mural, 2019)
Academic writing as a social enterprise
Social Enterprise.mp3Academic writing engages the writer with multiple texts authored by scholars in the field. According to Harrington (2017),
Writers choose texts to quote in order to connect themselves to particular traditions of thinking or researching; to put their arguments in the context of other, more prominent authors, whose views are already accepted by readers; or to put forth arguments or examples a writer wants to contest, examine, or elaborate. (p. 243)
Writers not only use these scholars’ theories as evidence to back up their arguments but also to expand their own ideas and thoughts. This demonstrates that academic writing is also a social enterprise where students have an opportunity to engage in a discourse with specialists in their field.
So, what do professors really mean by being original?
What Do Profs Mean By Being Original.mp3How many times have you heard a professor say, “Your essays need to have evidence quoted from scholarly sources. But I expect your ideas to be original”? This is usually followed by extensive coverage of academic integrity policies. But HOW to be original by copying others is never explained! The result? Students are left in confusion and fear of writing.
(Star Wars, 2016)
But guess what?
Professors are not really after isolated original ideas from you. They want you to synthesize the information that you have and provide your opinion on it. What university professors want is for students to use Ferguson’s elements of creativity: engage with scholarly work to build their knowledge, combine their learnings, and transform their authorial work with unique individual stylistic choices.