Royal Plagiarism I: Melania Trump “borrows” from Michelle Obama

Animated GIF shows that corresponding parts of their convention speeches are nearly identical. Slowly successive frames highlight the similar words and phrases, showing both direct and mosaic plagiarism. Melania’s speech writer was careless in keeping track whose words were whose, so the lesson here is to be very careful about who said what and that academic integrity demands respect for the words and ideas of others, not just by using them but also by giving credit where it’s due. Thank you, Melania, for glorifying (even though inadvertently) your wise and noble predecessor. Image size 960×720 (file size 412 KB). Can be used as an animated-graphic slide within a PPT presentation about avoiding plagiarism (PPT must be in Slide-Show mode to activate the slow animation) or as a non-animated graphic in a handout; can be resized as needed. Note: You can pause an animated GIF during a PowerPoint Slide Show by Right-Clicking your mouse; you can resume animation with a Left-Click. This mouse-trick works in PPT 2010, but other PPT versions may work differently.

Used/tested and engaging with English Composition, English 101.

To learn how to make such animated GIFs using PowerPoint and a free online AGIF maker, see PowerPoint slide show Animated GIFs—How to Make and Use.

Suggested Alt-Text (100 characters) for more accessible images: Melania (inadvertently) plagiarized Michelle by using the same phrases in their convention speeches.

Reference Note: See Royal Plagiarism II: AG Barr Misquotes Mueller Report to Spin It for Trump. Also, see Royal Plagiarism III: Joe Biden’s Uncited, Mosaic Paraphrase of Neil Kinnock. Also, see Royal Plagiarism IV: Actor Ashton Kutcher recycled (uncited) for high school.