To Those From Whom We Have Learned

Postplagiarism: Understanding the Difference Between Referencing and Giving Attribution by Sarah Elaine Eaton
Postplagiarism.com, September 5, 2025

Sarah Elaine Eaton has become a go-to thinker for navigating the messiness of the new age of knowledge production and learning ushered in by the arrival of generative AI technologies. Her most recent article, “Postplagiarism: Understanding the Difference Between Referencing and Giving Attribution,” once again charts an important shift in how we teach students about research, metacognition, and developing ideas. What’s most refreshing about Eaton’s wider work can be found in this article, as she manages to articulate and defend a coherent set of academic values even as the ground shifts beneath our feet. Eaton’s article begins with the claim “that attribution remains vital even as definitions of plagiarism evolve,” arguing that “the need to recognize and pay respect to those from whom we have learned remains constant.” Following this claim, Eaton argues that attribution, rather than citation, is the operative framework for reflection on AI. Because “attribution requires meta-cognitive awareness and evaluative judgement,” it moves students “from a defensive practice (avoiding plagiarism accusations) to an affirmative one (acknowledging the intellectual debt we owe to others who have generously shared their knowledge with us).” More broadly, Eaton’s clear-eyed disentangling of attribution and citation puts student learning at the center of our work in the classroom, asking them to consider how they know what they know and the origins of their ideas and thinking. In other words, in our post-plagiarism moment, developing the skills of attribution offers students deeper context and reflection for the process of learning with, through, and about technology, media, and research.

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