This month’s Resource Highlight was contributed by Rebecca S. Funke, Director of Library Resources at Des Moines Area Community College.
This month, we are featuring two resources that are useful for those working with OER, particularly for those sharing open resources outside of their original context: the BCcampus Self-Publishing Guide’s chapter on Citation versus Attribution and the OpenWashington Open Attribution Builder.
Attribution versus Citation
Attributions are to OER, what citations are to copyright restricted works. They are a means of not only giving credit to the authors of openly licensed works but also to avoid copyright infringement. Whether you are adopting, adapting, or creating OER, you will likely see and use attributions in various ways.
BCcampus’ Self-Publishing Guide includes a section on Citation vs Attribution. The authors do a nice job to show not only difference, but also the similarities between citations of restricted use works and attributions of open works. The table below highlights some of these 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 give 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. |
Providing Attribution
We’ve provided an example of an attribution for the Citation versus Attribution table above. Creating attributions can be as easy as using the Open Attribution Builder created by Open Washington. This interactive tool is similar to citation generators and guides you through the process, prompting you for elements of the attribution such as the Author, License, and Title for the resource you are using. The Attribution Builder is free and simple to use, and absolutely worth a trial run.
Additional Resources
While we’ve only highlighted two small resources to get you started this month, we hope that they will help you find your way around this important aspect of Open Educational Practice. Below are a few more resources you may want to consult as you delve deeper into attribution for OER:
- “How to give attribution” (Creative Commons)
- “What are Creative Commons Licenses?” video (University of Guelph Library)
- “Creative Commons Licenses” (The OER Starter Kit)