By ALEXANDER DOLITSKY
Plagiarism is the representation of another person’s language, thoughts, ideas, or expressions as one’s own original work. Indeed, it is a shameful and unprofessional intellectual practice; just like stealing someone else’s property. In my opinion, however, a fabrication is even worse practice — the act of inventing false information in order to deceive someone.
I have no tolerance for either — plagiarism and fabrication. In my upbringing I learned an enduring lesson of unintentional plagiarism when I was a second-grade student (8 years old) in the elementary school in Kiev, former Soviet Union (today Ukraine), in the late 1950s and early 1960s.
In the former Soviet Union, during my school years, the 10-year school term was split into elementary (years 1–4), middle (years 5–8), and senior (years 9–10) classes. All grades occupied the same large building and school complex. The academic year was from Sept. 1 through May 30, five days a week, with one short break in the winter and another in the spring. Kindergarten was a separate institution from the secondary school system.
The school curriculum was compulsory for all, carefully censored by government’s officials and standardized throughout the entire country. Textbooks and instructional material were contextually harmonized, for example, from schools in Vladivostok in the Russian Far East to Kiev in Ukraine or to Tashkent in Uzbekistan.
The school discipline was strict and teaching methods demanding, requiring intense drilling and repetitions to learn natural sciences and math subjects, and frequent memorization of the texts in social sciences, history and literature.
My elementary school teacher, Lyudmila Sergeevna Kozlova, was a strict disciplinarian; she demanded from her students absolute obedience, respect and compliance to her orders. One time, our homework assignment was to compose a short verse that would describe our patriotic feelings, commitment and love for the country — the Soviet Union. I was a reasonable chess player for my age, but creative writing was not my “cup of tea.”
So, I chose an easy way out—at home I copied one of Alexander Pushkin’s verses from his famous novel Eugene Onegin. This Pushkin’s novel in verse is considered a classic of Russian literature.
Alexander Pushkin (1799–1937) was a Russian poet, playwright and novelist. He is considered to be the greatest Russian poet, as well as founder of modern Russian literature. In Russia, even today, he is synonymous with William Shakespeare. In fact, my parents had a small library at home and Pushkin was a centerpiece of it.
So, on the following day, I selected a short verse associated with a romantic illustration in the book, a scene where Eugene Onegin confessed his love to Tatyana, another key character of the novel. The next day I submitted “my (i.e., Pushkin) verse” to my teacher. I speculated that in the absence of a better literary option, Onegin’s confession of his love to Tatyana could suffice my love for the mother-Russia:
I loved you. And, it might well be, this notion
Is not extinguished in my soul just yet;
But may it cease to bring on your commotion;
I do not wish to make you feel upset.
I loved you mutely, hopelessly, and dearly,
With bashful, jealous suffering one can’t know;
I loved you tenderly and so sincerely,
May God grant that another love you so.
~ Translation by David Mark Bennett
At the end of the class, Lyudmila Sergeevna collected classmates’ verses for correction and verification of the students’ homework.
The day after she came to the class with visible enthusiasm and excitement. “We have a genius in our class,” she announced proudly to all classmates. “It is Alexander Dolitsky, our young and talented poet!”
She read “my (i.e., Pushkin’s) short poem” to the whole class, then with a friendly smile asked me to stand up and accompanied by my classmates’ cheerful ovation she re-seated me from the last row to the front of the classroom. My classmates stared at me in amazement, with a sense of admiration and curiosity. I, however, was trembling, terrified inside and wanted to run far away in space or hide under the thick blanket.
Later that day, Lyudmila Sergeevna shared “my verses” with a teacher of Russian literature and language Lilya Gregorievna Dobrova. This teacher, of course, immediately recognized the original author. “Yes, this is Alexander alright,” she declared. “But not Dolitsky, it is Alexander Pushkin!”
Lyudmila Sergeevna was embarrassed that she failed to recognize a legendary Russian poet. She came back to the classroom steaming with anger, ordered me to stand up, grabbed my left ear very hard and pulled me to the back row of the classroom. Then she loudly announced to all classmates, “Alexander Dolitsky is a thief; he stole verses of our famous poet Alexander Pushkin as his own, shame!” She finally released my ear that probably grew up several centimeters longer from her hard grab.
School teachers and my parents were notified of the incident; and for me there was no place to run away or hide from this unintentional plagiarism. My situation in the school was doomed; I was picked on and laughed at by fellow students and teachers.
My mother also was an elementary school teacher in a different school district in Kiev. She was not pleased with my wrongdoing, but realized that some damage control must be done in order to rectify the situation. Several weeks after the incident, my mother set aside a little bottle with red ink in it and commanded me to give the bottle to Lyudmila Sergeevna, as a gesture of goodwill and forgiveness. Evidently, the red ink was a deficit in Kiev; it was used by teachers for correcting students’ work.
The winters were cold in Kiev in the 1950s and 1960s. This winter day was exceptionally cold, about –30C. I walked to school holding a little bottle with red ink under my clothes on my belly so it would not freeze before my meeting Lyudmila Sergeevna. While in school, I sheepishly approached Lyudmila Sergeevna, pulled out the bottle from my shirt and whispered, “This is from my mother, I am sorry.” Lyudmila Sergeevna decisively rejected my offer with a stoic and uncompromising demeanor, resembling Joseph Stalin in a short “woman’s skirt.” “Tell your mother not to send me gifts anymore, go to your place,” she ordered.
So, the gift was not accepted and, therefore, a compromise and forgiveness could not be reached between us. Indeed, for one day I was a talented and promising young poet and the next day my fame turned tragically into “slipping on the banana peels.”
In the following academic year, my mother transferred me to another school in order to provide me a safe environment and fair treatment in the new setting. In reality, an innocent plagiarism of Alexander Pushkin’s verse resulted in severe punishment for my wrongdoing.
Plagiarism is not illegal in the United States in most situations. Instead, it is considered a violation of honor or professional ethics codes and can result in disciplinary action.
Fabrication, however, is making up data or results and manipulating research materials or changing results so that the information is not accurately represented, altered or reported. Obviously, fabrication of data and research are extremely serious forms of misconduct because it can result in an inaccurate information or scientific record that does not reflect a factual truth.
Presently, far-left media and pro-Palestinian “Hamas lovers” notoriously and intentionally fabricate information, misinterpreting history of Israel and the Middle East, and manipulating facts in relation to today’s Israel/Gaza/Hamas war. These progressive “Hamas lovers” continuously misconstruing the history of Judeo/Israel and, subsequently, falsely accuse Israel in genocide, apartheid and the occupation of Gaza.
Dixie Belcher’s article published in the Juneau Empire on February 26 and Kirsa Hughes-Skandijs letter published in the Juneau Empire on March 19 are remarkably erroneous, with no fact checked by the editor of the Juneau Empire. These two pieces are clear and indisputable examples of the fabrication and manipulation of information on the Israel/Gaza/Hamas war. Were these fabrications published in the Juneau Empire an editor’s oversight or were they done by an intentional design of the authors?
As Golda Meir, an Israeli fourth prime minister from 1969 to 1974, observed: “One cannot and must not try to erase the past merely because it does not fit the present.”
Alexander B. Dolitsky was born and raised in Kiev in the former Soviet Union. He received an M.A. in history from Kiev Pedagogical Institute, Ukraine, in 1976; an M.A. in anthropology and archaeology from Brown University in 1983; and was enroled in the Ph.D. program in Anthropology at Bryn Mawr College from 1983 to 1985, where he was also a lecturer in the Russian Center. In the U.S.S.R., he was a social studies teacher for three years, and an archaeologist for five years for the Ukranian Academy of Sciences. In 1978, he settled in the United States. Dolitsky visited Alaska for the first time in 1981, while conducting field research for graduate school at Brown. He lived first in Sitka in 1985 and then settled in Juneau in 1986. From 1985 to 1987, he was a U.S. Forest Service archaeologist and social scientist. He was an Adjunct Assistant Professor of Russian Studies at the University of Alaska Southeast from 1985 to 1999; Social Studies Instructor at the Alyeska Central School, Alaska Department of Education from 1988 to 2006; and has been the Director of the Alaska-Siberia Research Center (see www.aksrc.homestead.com) from 1990 to present. He has conducted about 30 field studies in various areas of the former Soviet Union (including Siberia), Central Asia, South America, Eastern Europe and the United States (including Alaska). Dolitsky has been a lecturer on the World Discoverer, Spirit of Oceanus, andClipper Odyssey vessels in the Arctic and sub-Arctic regions. He was the Project Manager for the WWII Alaska-Siberia Lend Lease Memorial, which was erected in Fairbanks in 2006. He has published extensively in the fields of anthropology, history, archaeology, and ethnography. His more recent publications include Fairy Tales and Myths of the Bering Strait Chukchi, Ancient Tales of Kamchatka; Tales and Legends of the Yupik Eskimos of Siberia; Old Russia in Modern America: Russian Old Believers in Alaska; Allies in Wartime: The Alaska-Siberia Airway During WWII; Spirit of the Siberian Tiger: Folktales of the Russian Far East; Living Wisdom of the Far North: Tales and Legends from Chukotka and Alaska; Pipeline to Russia; The Alaska-Siberia Air Route in WWII; and Old Russia in Modern America: Living Traditions of the Russian Old Believers; Ancient Tales of Chukotka, and Ancient Tales of Kamchatka.
