Discussions of plagiarism in academics usually centers on students being dishonest and cheating in their work and exams. However, as The Daily Pennsylvanian reports, an expanding controversy in the Sociology department at the University of Pennsylvania highlights a lesser-known form -- alleged plagiarism between professors (and in this case, between colleagues in the same department):

Penn Sociology professor Elijah Anderson released a statement accusing one of his colleagues of under-citing his work in her new book. For the first time, Anderson publicly said Promises I Can Keep: Why Poor Women Choose Motherhood Over Marriage -- co-authored by Kathryn Edin, another Penn sociologist -- “owes a strong and almost entirely unacknowledged debt to” his previous books.

The controversy erupted last week when Sociology professor emeritus Harold Bershady sent an e-mail to the Penn Sociology department. In the Sept. 29 memo, Bershady said that Edin and her co-author Maria Kefalas -- a St. Joseph’s University professor already accused of plagiarizing material in one of her previous books -- had stolen ideas from Anderson and neglected to acknowledge it.

I am somewhat familiar with Elijah Anderson’s work but not familiar with the work of Edin or Kefelas, nor have I read the book in question. I was also briefly introduced to Professor Anderson when I delivered the welcoming message as a graduate student to an audience for a presentation that he gave at SUNY Albany back in 1996.

Therefore, while I do not know him well personally, I am probably a little biased in favor of Professor Anderson as I also consider him, as the article points out, to be one our discipline’s pioneering African American scholars and an inspiration to scholars of color around the country.

However, at this point, I will not take a position on this particular controversy, only to point out that we as scholars are not immune to the rigorous expectations of honesty and professionalism to which we supposedly hold our students. In other words, if we talk the talk, we have to also walk the walk.