How Can We Paraphrase Without Getting Plagiarism?

Plagiarism is a nagging issue in many writing niches today. So, how can you paraphrase to avoid it?

The use of plagiarism in a paper can be attributed to a number of reasons. One of the most common is that the student does not know how to cite sources properly. However, some students may also plagiarize because they cannot write their thoughts and ideas into essays.

If you paraphrase properly and cite your sources, you can avoid plagiarism effectively. That's the purpose of this article, as it'll help you understand how you can avoid plagiarism in your articles. So, let's dive right into it.

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How to Paraphrase Without Getting Plagiarism?

Paraphrasing to avoid plagiarism is a step-by-step process. However, there are some aspects that you need to etch in your writing tactic to avoid plagiarism. 

Therefore, you can do many things, such as rewrite entire content or paraphrase online to avoid plagiarism. So, let's talk about how you can paraphrase without getting plagiarism: 

Paraphrase To Restate an Idea

The definition of paraphrasing is to restate the meaning of a text by altering various words within it. However, this technique is only viable when rewriting or rephrasing your content. You need to restate an idea to paraphrase another author's content without plagiarizing. 

This means a total teardown of the content from top-to-bottom. But how exactly do you do this? Here's a sentence for example:

"The good writer always researches more than he or she writes. So, they are never short on information for the content."

It's a set of two sentences describing a simple idea. But how do we paraphrase it to restate the idea? Here's how:

"The trait of a good writer is researching profusely. This is exactly what allows them to have an abundance of information for their writings."

As you can see, the paraphrased text describes the same idea. However, it's important to understand here that this particular content has taken some deep words from the vocabulary. You don't have to do that, but you should if you can.

The more you alternate between words to describe and restate an existing idea, the better. And on top of that, it'll remove all claims of plagiarism from the content. 

Try Changing the Content's Voice

The term "voice" is used to describe the tone or attitude of a piece of writing. Voice can be either active or passive. Active voice is when the subject of a sentence performs the action, while passive voice is when the action is performed on the subject. For example:

• Active: "The boy kicked the ball."
• Passive: "The ball was kicked by the boy."

As you can see, the passive voice puts the subject before the noun. Whereas active voice does the exact opposite. Why is this important? Because it's one of the key aspects of writing quality content. But does it play a role in avoiding plagiarism?

Yes, it does. Mainly because content's voice is something synonymous with writers. So, deviating from this aspect of your content naturally becomes different from what you've written. But, it's important that you prefer to rephrase the content in the active voice—as it's much more preferable.

Use a Viable Tool

The online world is filled with unique tools, and it's never too late to seek assistance from one. These tools that help you paraphrase online have become very advanced and their ability to write human-like content is one of their leading traits.

That's exactly why you need them. But why exactly should you use a tool?

• A lot more convenient than paraphrasing manually;
• Rephrases much more efficiently;
• Saves a lot of time and hassle;
• Some tools might even offer various content modes.

Now, you need to pick a tool that offers these many options. Hence, you'll have to find a tool you can use regularly.

You can rephrase content as much as you like with an online paraphrasing tool. Such an online tool can help you to maintain the word count in your article/blog without causing redundancy. 

Moreover, you can keep the readability tone and style based on your audience’s persona with the help of an online paraphrasing tool.

Alter the Phrases: Using Synonyms 

The value of synonyms cannot be understated. A synonym can condense important information within a few words or vice versa. But, using the right synonyms is important, as using something way too difficult defeats the purpose. 

Why is that? Because a difficult synonym might avoid plagiarism but defeats the purpose of readability. That's why it's important to pick the right synonyms, such as these few examples:

• Write 'baby' instead of 'infant';
• Write 'correct' instead of accurate
• Prefer to write same instead of alike/similar;
• Write a trip instead of a journey.

Granted, there are times when using the more difficult synonym is much more suitable. However, readability is one of the most important aspects of any content. So, while you might avoid plagiarism, you cannot ensure readability by using difficult synonyms.

That's why you'll have to alter phrases using simple synonyms. Here's an example of doing so:

• Difficult: "The jets circled the air on the horizon above the city's skyline. This exhibition was a part of the national day parade in the urban square."
• Simple: "The jets flew over the city as part of the national day parade in the city square."

As you can see here, the simpler synonym is much easier and avoids plagiarism comprehensively. 

Citation or Quotation 

Quotations are one of the most efficient ways of avoiding plagiarism. However, once you've paraphrased the content, the ownership doesn't change; it's still the original author's idea. So, you accredit them in your content by using citations or references.

There are many ways of citing or quoting the original author. That's why you should pick the one that's more suitable for your writing style, i.e., academic, blogging, social media, etc. So, make sure that you don't only paraphrase your content but also cite the sources that you use to avoid plagiarism. 

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These are some of the best ways to paraphrase to avoid plagiarism. Now, it's necessary that you paraphrase with the intention of avoiding plagiarism. The loss of intention is one of the main reasons plagiarism happens in the first place. So, make sure you avoid plagiarism using these tactics.