5 All About Attribution
What is attribution?
Open educational resources, like this user guide, are made of either original or adapted content. Any adapted content should be either 1) used with permission and/or 2) openly licensed. When using this content, as creators, we must communicate what material is original and ours, and what material is created by someone else; we do this by providing attribution.
Citation vs. Attribution
But isn’t attribution just another form of citation? No. While similar, they are used for different purposes in an open educational resource
Citation is a rigorous method of crediting others ideas, research and scholarly outputs; a crucial component of academic integrity and preventing plagiarism.
Attribution is a legal requirement of open license agreements, such as Creative Commons, and concerns rights of use covered by copyright laws. Refer to the table below to see the differences.
| Citation | Attribution |
|---|---|
| Academic and legal purposes (plagiarism and copyright infringement). | Legal purposes (e.g., rules of Creative Commons licences). |
| The rights of the copy (meaning copyright) are NOT shared with the general public by the copyright holder. | Copyright IS shared with the general public by the copyright holder by marking the work with an open-copyright licence. |
| Protects an author who wants to refer to a restricted work by another author. | Author of an open work has given advanced permissions to use their work. |
| Used to quote or paraphrase a limited portion of a restricted work. | Used to quote (or paraphrase) all or a portion of an openly licensed work. |
| Can paraphrase, but cannot change work without permission. | Author has given advanced permission to change work. |
| Many citation styles are available: APA, Chicago, MLA. | Attribution statement styles are still emerging, but there are some defined best practices. |
| A reference list of cited resources are typically placed at the end of the book. | Attribution statements are found on the same page as the resource |
Table. Citation vs. Attribution adapted from Self-Publishing Guide by Lauri M. Aesoph, licensed under a Creative Commons Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
How to Attribute
Attributing content is nowhere near as rigorous as the citation process, however, there are still best practices. There are multiple examples and fill-in-the-blank guides in the template but we will take this opportunity to explain the elements of a great attribution.
Elements of an Attribution (TASL)
The following entry is adapted from the Recommended practices for attribution by Creative Commons, which is shared under a CC BY 4.0 license. Revisions have been made to simplify the text and add recommendations based on standards at Centennial College.
Whenever you are reusing CC licensed works, we recommend that the attribution include the Title, Author, Source, and License. This is true whether you’re sharing the work as-is or if you have made an adaptation. To remember these attribution elements, it’s helpful to think of the acronym: TASL.
Title
What is the name of the work?
If a title was provided for the work, include it as a part of the attribution. Sometimes a title is not provided; in that case, simple put Untitled.
Author
Who allows you to use the work?
We often use “author” as a shorthand when we are, legally speaking, referring to the “licensor” (a.k.a., the “copyright holder” or “rightsholder”). This is because, in most cases, the licensor is the same person or entity as the author. When an author is licensing their work under an open license, and has made their name available, include the author’s name as a component in your attribution. This may not be the legal of an individual; it may be the name of an entity, like a company or institution, or a user name for an online account. Try your best to identify the name of the copyright holder – if it is properly openly licensed, this information should be easy to find. If you cannot find it, take a moment and ask yourself “am I permitted to use this material”? If in doubt ask an OER Librarian!
Source
Where can people find the work?
Please make it possible for future users to find the source of the material by including a URL or hyperlink where the work resides. This often is where you found the work. If you found it somewhere other than the original site, try to include information about the original site where the work was first shared publicly. Hyperlinks are preferred for accessibility purposes. We encourage you to hyperlink the source in the title name of your attribution. Try to always include a hyperlink your license information too!
License
How can you use the work?
You must specify which open license was applied to the work you are using. It is also important to provide a link to this license “deed” (details of the license terms). If you have received permission to use a work that is not openly licensed, include a note that says “Used with permission.” Make sure you have permission and that it is filed with the OER Librarian.
Attribution Do’s & Don’ts
DO |
DON’T |
|
|
Where to put Attribution
You can place attributions in multiple places; for example, I embedded an attribution into the above text for the TASL section of this chapter. However, if you have multiple attributions throughout multiple chapters, you strive to make the location of this information consistent. The attribution statement can be located at the beginning of a chapter or section; at the end or right beneath the adapted entry.
Centennial College recommends that you include attribution statements at the bottom of the chapter with any chapter references.
Adaptation Declaration
In some cases, pre-existing, openly-licensed work may be adapted with little changes. For example, maybe you want to update an outdated nutrition textbook for a Canadian context; This involves adding an original chapter, removing some standards and adding some Canadian ones. Do you have to include an attribution statement for every chapter? No.
Instead include an “adaptation declaration” in the front matter of the book. Take a look at the Centennial College Open Textbook Template’s About this Book section.
We recommend writing a declaration if you use a significant portion of an openly licensed work. The example of above is one such case, another example could be: you have made a new textbook using 5 entire chapters from one open textbook and 6 from a different open textbook for a new work with a total of 11 chapters. If there are very few changes at the chapter level it is easier to simply write a declaration outline the chapters belonging to each text.
More Resources on Attribution
Check out:
- Our chapter on Image Attribution Examples
- Our chapter on Media Attribution Examples
- Our Annotated Resource Guide
