Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Okigbo - Mythmaker & towncrier at Heavensgate

Oga Chidi,
I was thinking your last line was going to read 'the end does not ALWAYS justify the means', leaving some margin of possibility. Again, you lost the moment of criticality there. And that has been my point since Okigbo resurrected on this forum.

As I followed the thread, it occurred to me that plagiarism should be inducted into the conceptual hall of fame (or infamy) of 'essentially contested concepts' whose history ensure they defy any neat universal characterisation, except in context.

The simple point of the problem, as I think Ikhide or someone else wrote earlier, is that too many ideas have entered the artistic, and even the academic, common for plagiarism there to stick as a neat accusation. The case of music is glaring. Just as the case of academic plagiarism is equally glaring on the negative side. If, as Ikhide wrote, I used 'How did Uncle Momoh die? He died' (referencing unconsciously a phrase he 'borrowed' from James Hadley Chase many century ago, did he plagiarise?

Early last year, I was shocked to see one of my essays under another person's 'ownership' on the net. The guy's 'creative ingenuity' was only limited to the title. The first word in the abstract to the last in the reference were all mine. Of course, I was livid with anger. And I got right to work (without taking the legality to its logical conclusion, though).

Yet, like Olayinka made clear, I would also have been amazed if I see a truly ingenious and creative adaptation of my poem. I suspect you might too. Even my earlier statement of 'the words were all mine' should be taken with caution too.

So: May be plagiarism looks seriously bad in academic matters (when it is taken beyond boundary) than in the artistic. It is that possibility of conceptual shiftiness that interests me, and not the attempt at hanging an absolute albatross around the neck of the plagiarist-positive or negative.

Is abortion absolutely wrong? Does convention not have a role to play in moral judgements? You have dragged plagiarism into the murky realm of the moral, and so you must be responsible for what you meet there. And you are not allowed to bring the 'motor park mentality' to your rescue!


Adeshina Afolayan

Postscript: What happens to me if 'the murky realm of the moral' or 'the absolute albatross around the neck of the plagiarist' has been written somewhere else by someone else without my awareness? Does that not make it interesting?


Sent from my BlackBerry wireless device from MTN

-----Original Message-----
From: Chidi Anthony Opara <chidi.opara@gmail.com>
Sender: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Date: Sat, 16 Mar 2013 01:15:46
To: USA Africa Dialogue Series<usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
Reply-To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Okigbo - Mythmaker & towncrier at Heavensgate

"It has been suggested that there were plagiarists who successfully
used the method. Didn't you read Obododimma's post? "Prior to the
Enlightenment, plagiarism was useful in aiding the distribution of
ideas. An English poet could appropriate and translate a sonnet from
Petrarch and call it his own. In accordance with the classical
aesthetic of imitation, this was perfectly acceptable practice."

So, if it served that function then, was that equally bad?

-------Adeshina Afolayan.

Shina,
Almost every illegality can be excused on the grounds that it has some
positive sides; the pick-pocket who takes care of aged parents, the
armed robber who sees siblings through schools, the stealing
politician who sets up a scholarship awarding foundation. I can go on,
but let me keep it simple as usual; "the end does not justify the
means".

CAO.

Post Script:
"In fact, it might be very interesting to ask when the notion of
wrongness attached to plagiarism came into existence, when
copyrighting and its implications became applicable to authors."

----------Professor Ken Harrow.

On 15 Mar, 17:34, shina73_1...@yahoo.com wrote:
> Oga Chidi,
> No vex now! We are all involved in an attempt to outline a perspective on something that is truly baffling (and not a situation of impressing colleagues, haba!).
>
> It has been suggested that there were plagiarists who successfully used the method. Didn't you read Obododimma's post?
>
> "Prior to the Enlightenment, plagiarism was useful in aiding the distribution of ideas. An English poet could appropriate and translate a sonnet from Petrarch and call it his own. In accordance with the classical aesthetic of imitation, this was perfectly acceptable practice."
>
> So, if it served that function then, was that equally bad? Of course, some things are really either good or bad (a really bad one is ascribing some wrong intention to a fellow forumite who was only attempting to further the conceptual search for a shifting notion). I disagree however that plagiarism is one of those white/black issues.
>
> That should be clear from the fact that we have yet to reach a tidy conclusion on the Okigbo phenomenon.
>
> And there you have it!
>
> Adeshina Afolayan
>
> Sent from my BlackBerry wireless device from MTN
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Chidi Anthony Opara <chidi.op...@gmail.com>
>
> Sender: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
> Date: Fri, 15 Mar 2013 02:02:39
> To: USA Africa Dialogue Series<usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
> Reply-To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
> Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Okigbo - Mythmaker & towncrier at Heavensgate
>
> "Chidi's attempt to draw a white/black distinction is simplistic to
> me. Plagiarism cannot just be explained away as an absolute sin. I am
> seriously and conceptually perplexed though."
> ---------Adeshina Afolayan.
>
> Does it have to be complex to be right and/or make sense? Some matters
> are simply right or wrong and plagiarism is one of them. You may be
> confusing being simple with being simplistic. I  have no scholar
> colleagues and students to impress. You are however, entitled to your
> opinion.
>
> CAO.
>
> On 14 Mar, 21:45, shina73_1...@yahoo.com wrote:
> > "Shouldn't we shift the
> > debate from outrage to the wider significance and presence of
> > plagiarism in canonical literature?"
>
> > Obododimma
>
> > Given the deep level of controversy around Okigbo's 'borrowing'/'stealing' so far and the problematic and shifting conceptual boundary of plagiarism especially in our own time, it would seem to me that the suggestion above, though interesting, is putting the cart before the horse.
>
> > Before this post, I tried getting at the etymology of plagiarism without much success. I was wondering if its early use, circa 1620, would throw some conceptual light on how its meaning has shifted from a pragmatic practice to a perjorative one.
>
> > Most dictionaries privilege the 'stealing' assumption. Merriam-Webster traces its origin to the Latin 'plagiarius' meaning kidnapper (derived from 'plagium' or netting of game; and further from 'plaga' or trap). 'Plagiary' was originally used in 1716 (What happened in the 96 years in between?). Ah!
>
> > Well, what does this tell us? Lexical definitions often conceal philosophical complexities! Something conceptual must have happened to lead us through this convoluted etymology from seemingly negative origin through a fruitful borrowing to rejuvenation of the original sin. Is there a philologist in the forum?
>
> > Chidi's attempt to draw a white/black distinction is simplistic to me. Plagiarism cannot just be explained away as an absolute sin. I am seriously and conceptually perplexed though.
>
> > Maybe Prof. Harrow's suggestion of intertexuality could bridge this problem between the positive and negative dimensions of plagiarism.
>
> > Adeshina Afolayan
>
> > Sent from my BlackBerry wireless device from MTN
>
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Obododimma Oha <obodo...@gmail.com>
>
> > Sender: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
> > Date: Wed, 13 Mar 2013 14:40:16
> > To: <usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com>
> > Reply-To: usaafricadialogue@googlegroups.com
> > Subject: Re: USA Africa Dialogue Series - Okigbo - Mythmaker & towncrier at Heavensgate
>
> > I do NOT endorse plagiarism. It is objectionable and infuriating, yes.
> > But with the ongoing debate, I have had to return to deeper issues in
> > the discourse on plagiarism and have found the arguments of the
> > Critical Art Ensemble (in "Utopian Plagiarism, Hypertextuality, and
> > Electronic Cultural Production") really engaging: "Prior to the
> > Enlightenment, plagiarism was useful in aiding the distribution of
> > ideas. An English poet could appropriate and translate a sonnet from
> > Petrarch and call it his own. In accordance with the classical
> > aesthetic of imitation, this was perfectly acceptable practice. The
> > real value of this activity rested less in the reinforcement of
> > classical aesthetics than in the distribution of work to areas where
> > otherwise it probably would not have appeared. The works of English
> > plagiarists, such as Chaucer, Shakespeare, Spenser, Sterne, Coleridge,
> > and De Quincey, are still a vital part of the English heritage, and
> > remain in the literary canon to this day."Shouldn't we shift the
> > debate from outrage to the wider significance and presence of
> > plagiarism in canonical literature?
> > -Obododimma
>
> > On 3/4/13, kenneth harrow <har...@msu.edu> wrote:
> > > let's talk examples.
> > > for instance:
>
> > > A while back on Next, the poet Chimalum Nwankwo offered evidence that
> > > Okigbo had plagiarized some of his poems. He quoted Carl Sandberg's
> > > poem, For You: /"The peace of great doors be for you./Wait at the knobs,
> > > at the panel oblongs./Wait for the great hinges.//The peace of great
> > > churches be for you./Where the players of loft pipe organs/Practice old
> > > lovely fragments, alone//The peace of great books be for you,/Stains of
> > > pressed clover leaves on pages,/Bleach of the light of years held in
> > > leather.//The peace of great prairies be for you./Listen among
> > > windplayers in cornfields./The wind learning over its oldest music."/
>
> > > He contrasted it with Okigbo's The Passage: /"O Anna at the knobs of the
> > > panel oblong,/Hear us at the crossroads at the great hinges/Where the
> > > players of loft pipe organs/Rehearse old lovely fragments,
> > > alone-//Strains of pressed orange leaves on pages/Bleach of the light of
> > > years held in leather://For we are listening in cornfields/Among the
> > > windplayers,/Listening to the wind leaning over/Its loveliest fragment…."
> > > /
>
> > > this is an instance in which...i plagiarized ikhide. he did the heavy
> > > lifting, and i just copied.
> > > which he did from nwankwo.
> > > ken
> > > p.s.(go read the whole thing if you want the argument, at
> > >http://xokigbo.wordpress.com/tag/okigbo/)
> > > pps. i always found sandberg boring; now he comes alive!
>
> > > On 3/4/13 9:47 AM, Ikhide wrote:
> > >> "From a critical point, and having studied Okigbo's work quite
> > >> closely, I'm generally amused by those who keep talking about Okigbo's
> > >> "plagiarism." Plagiarismn occurs when you do not acknowledge your
> > >> sources. What Okigbo does is radical/misprision/, to sometimes upturn,
> > >> decontextualize and recontextualize an extant poetic line or imagery,
> > >> and in refashioning it give a newer more authentic feel to sometimes
> > >> flat or obscure lines. Okigbo was a bold experimentalist, far ahead of
> > >> his time in his form of intertextual integration. It was a poetic
> > >> practice and method based on the notion later noted by postmodernist
> > >> theorists which Okigbo put into practice by a system of collages,
> > >> revisisons, reproductions, and re-interpretaions, of the boundedness
> > >> of language; or as Derrida would put it: "Il n'y a pas de hors-texte."
> > >> Okigbo, I think, is to modern poetry, what Picasso is to the Arts."
>
> > >> Obi,
>
> > >> Thanks for sharing. These conversations generally devolve into
> > >> defensiveness, etc. I think that charges of plagiarism re Okigbo are
> > >> not lightly dismissed. I have a copy of the book and in my view
> > >> influences are to be distinguished from outright copying. Okigbo does
> > >> not address what he was trying to do by basically using other folks'
> > >> works and passing them on as his. The lifting is not a line or two,
> > >> but pretty extensive. He should have more specifically acknowledged
> > >> the authors and the works.  Today, if a student came before you with
> > >> works so blatantly lifted, I would hope that you would give the
> > >> student a zero and another chance to produce something truly original.
>
> > >> My interest is not to diminish the gift that was Okigbo. I am
> > >> fascinated that many African scholars choose look at that issue
> > >> (plagiarism charges) with a little more than a sideways glance. That
> > >> issue is an integral part of Okigbo and addressing it in any work on
> > >> Okigbo raises the importance and usefulness of that work. This is one
> > >> reason I love to read obituaries by Western journalists. If you read
> > >> the obituaries of Dim Ojukwu in the NYT and the UK Guardian, you are
> > >> blown away by the depth and breadth of the work that went into it.
> > >> Contrast them with the silly hagiographies from Nigerian newspapers
> > >> and you shake your head. Much of the work on Okigbo has been
> > >> adulatory, useful, but not rounded.
>
> > >> Clearly one has to be careful about throwing around charges of
> > >> plagiarism. There are clearly influences in writers' works. It is
> > >> perhaps impossible to avoid influences and reasonable people can infer
> > >> the difference between influences and outright plagiarism. A couple of
> > >> days ago, I wrote this short piece
> > >> <https://www.facebook.com/ikhide/posts/10151786497904616> about my
> > >> maternal uncle Momodu and I used two terms: "he traveled light", and
> > >> "How did Uncle Momodu die? He died." Ten words out of a 400 word
> > >> piece.
>
> ...
>
> read more »

--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the "USA-Africa Dialogue Series" moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin.
For current archives, visit http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
For previous archives, visit http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue-
unsubscribe@googlegroups.com
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialogue+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.


--
You received this message because you are subscribed to the "USA-Africa Dialogue Series" moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin.
For current archives, visit http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
For previous archives, visit http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue-
unsubscribe@googlegroups.com
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialogue+unsubscribe@googlegroups.com.
For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/groups/opt_out.