北大女博士抄袭门：你抄我抄大家抄

 　　As the Chinese common saying goes, “writing is borrowing, the only difference is whether you are skillful in doing that”. By coincidence, the great essayist, publisher, playwright¹, literary and social critic T. S. Eliot once also said that “good writers borrow, great writers steal”. Are these words all wrong? Or do we get these words right?

　　中国有句俗语，“天下文章一大抄，看你会抄不会抄”。无独有偶，伟大的作家、出版人、剧作家、文学家和社会评论家T.S.艾略特也曾说过，“优秀的作家借，伟大的作家偷”。这些话都是错的？还是说，我们理解对了吗？

　　August 27, 2014, China Daily posted a report named A Bold Move against Plagiarism², providing information on the Yu Yanru case. With the Doctor’s Degree in history from Peking University, Yu was accused by the Chinese Journal of Journalism³ and Communication of plagiarism in her thesis. January 10, 2015, Peking University announced that the accusation⁴ was true and it decided⁵ to revoke⁶ Yu’s doctorate⁷ and graduation degrees.

　　2014年8月27日，中国日报刊登了一篇题为《反抄袭的大胆一步》的文章，介绍了于艳茹抄袭事件。于艳茹是北京大学历史学博士，由于抄袭遭到《国际新闻界》杂志控告。今年1月15日，北京大学宣布称，于艳茹确有严重抄袭行为，决定撤销其博士学位。

　　In fact, plagiarism was, is and will still be a shared problem in the world, academically and non-academically. Believe it or not, even famous politicians have done it.

　　事实上，抄袭一直以来、也将长期作为一个世界性的问题，学术上、非学术上皆是如此。信不信由你，一些著名的政治人物也干过抄袭这事儿。

　　Putin and his doctoral thesis

　　普京和博士论文

　　In 2000, Washington Post reporter David Hoffman asked the St. Petersburg State Mining Institute for a copy of Putin’s 218-page doctoral thesis but was refused. In 2005, two researchers at the Brookings Institution in Washington got a copy of the thesis and presented their findings in the year next. What they found was appalling⁸ – Putin’s thesis heavily “borrowed” the content from a textbook written by Professors David I. Cleland and William R. King from the University of Pittsburgh.

　　2000年，华盛顿邮报记者大卫·霍夫曼向圣彼得堡国立矿业学院申请获取一份普京长达218页的博士论文的复印件，但是被拒绝了。2005年，华盛顿布鲁金斯学会的两名研究人员拿到了普京论文的复印件，并于2006年发布了他们的惊人发现——普京的论文大量“借用”了一本教科书中内容，该教科书是匹兹堡大学的大卫·克莱兰教授和威廉·金教授撰写的。

　　Although Putin did include the textbook in the bibliography⁹, but no quotations¹⁰ marks anywhere could be found in his thesis.

　　虽然普京在文献里确实提到了这本书，但他在文中完全没有任何有关引用的标明。

　　According to a 2014 report by the Science, the least “borrowing” problems can be found in German, America and Japan; while in Iran, Bulgaria and some other countries, such problems are severe.

　　根据美国《科学》杂志一份2014年的报告，所谓的“借用”问题在德国、美国和日本等国最为少见，而在伊朗、保加利亚等国则最为严重。

　　I think Lee Ellis is correct about T. S. Eliot’s words -- I interpret “steal” to mean, in this context, the act of taking from other texts themes, ideas, rhythms, structures, but not the sentences themselves.

　　我想，李·埃利斯对于T.S.艾略特的话的理解是正确的——我认为，所谓“偷”，指的是从其他文章的主旨、想法、节奏、结构中获得灵感，而不是直接用别人写的句子。

1 playwright   

n.剧作家，编写剧本的人

参考例句：

• Gwyn Thomas was a famous playwright.格温·托马斯是著名的剧作家。
• The playwright was slaughtered by the press.这位剧作家受到新闻界的无情批判。

2 plagiarism   

n.剽窃，抄袭

参考例句：

• Teachers in America fight to control cheating and plagiarism.美国老师们努力对付欺骗和剽窃的问题。
• Now he's in real trouble.He's accused of plagiarism.现在他是真遇到麻烦了。他被指控剽窃。

3 journalism   

n.新闻工作，报业

参考例句：

• He's a teacher but he does some journalism on the side.他是教师，可还兼职做一些新闻工作。
• He had an aptitude for journalism.他有从事新闻工作的才能。

4 accusation   

n.控告，指责，谴责

参考例句：

• I was furious at his making such an accusation.我对他的这种责备非常气愤。
• She knew that no one would believe her accusation.她知道没人会相信她的指控。

5 decided   

adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的

参考例句：

• This gave them a decided advantage over their opponents.这使他们比对手具有明显的优势。
• There is a decided difference between British and Chinese way of greeting.英国人和中国人打招呼的方式有很明显的区别。

6 revoke   

v.废除，取消，撤回

参考例句：

• The university may revoke my diploma.大学可能吊销我的毕业证书。
• The government revoked her husband's license to operate migrant labor crews.政府撤销了她丈夫管理外来打工人群的许可证。

7 doctorate   

n.(大学授予的)博士学位

参考例句：

• He hasn't enough credits to get his doctorate.他的学分不够取得博士学位。
• Where did she do her doctorate?她在哪里攻读博士？

8 appalling   

adj.骇人听闻的，令人震惊的，可怕的

参考例句：

• The search was hampered by appalling weather conditions.恶劣的天气妨碍了搜寻工作。
• Nothing can extenuate such appalling behaviour.这种骇人听闻的行径罪无可恕。

9 bibliography   

n.参考书目；(有关某一专题的)书目

参考例句：

• There is a useful bibliography at the end of each chapter.在每一章后附有一份有用的参考书目。
• The production of this bibliography is totally automated.这个目录的编制过程全是自动化的。

10 quotations   

n.引用( quotation的名词复数 )；[商业]行情（报告）；（货物或股票的）市价；时价

参考例句：

• The insurance company requires three quotations for repairs to the car. 保险公司要修理这辆汽车的三家修理厂的报价单。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• These quotations cannot readily be traced to their sources. 这些引语很难查出出自何处。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》