---
title: Improvement Era
description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930.
authors:
  - Young Men's Mutual Improvement Associations
collections:
  - periodicals
tags:
  - magazine
  - improvement-era
periodical: Improvement Era
volume: 18
number: 4
published: 1915-02
publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations
publisher_place: Salt Lake City
language: en
type: magazine
reference: "Young Men's Mutual Improvement Associations, \"Mutual Work,\" *Improvement Era* 18, no. 4 (February 1915): 367."
source:
  url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1804unse
  transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers.
  identifier: improvementera1804unse
start_page: 367
end_page: 367
rights:
  status: public-domain
  basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1915-02)
  source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera1804unse
  publication_year: 1915
  note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1915, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright.
---

# Mutual Work

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Mutual Work
                              Stake Work

                     Originality in Public Speaking

       Young people should learn early the need of stating information
which they may have obtained, in words of their own. Using without
credit other people's language and expression, besides being ethically
wrong and despicable, hinders the progress of the individual and re-
tards his growth in public speaking. Our present excellent activities in
contest work, in the Mutual Improvement Associations, carry with thcjm
possibilities of great harm to the contestants, if they are indiffernt about
thinking for themselves, and expressing their thoughts in their own
words. The individual contestants should carefully watch themselves
in this matter, so that plagiarism may be strictly avoided.       Wherever
it is  necessary to use other people's words, or tell other pepple's
stories, distinct, credit^ should be given to them by the speakers'.
     The public speaking contests which are now carried on in our
Mutual Improvement Associations are intended to be original on the
part of the person who speaks, as far as the construction of the speech
is* concerned, and also as far as possible in the development of the
argument or story. It is permissible, and really advisable, that the
contestants shall be coached, and that they shall receive as much train-
ing for the contest as they can get. If they so prefer, they may pat-
tern after model orators, and even adopt the style of some favorite
orator.   It is also legitimate to secure all the criticism from friends
and teachers, that they can get, but it is entirely wrong for them to
copy other people's words and adopt them as their own, or quote from
other writers without giving such writers due credit. Of course, it is
not expected that our contestants shall be original in the sense that
they are to create everything new, but it is emphatically impressed
upon them that they shall avoid the direct use of other writers' or
speakers' words and ideas, without acknowledging the sources.         In
public speaking, particularly among the young, the speakers, it has been
noticed, frequently commit to memory paragraphs and pages of other
writer's productions and repeat them without proper credit being given
to the source. This must be avoided. In order to experience the very
best results from our contest work, officers should impress upon the
contestants early in the contest the need of getting all the information
and help they can to help develop and present their theme but aftre this
                                                             ;

help and information is received, they themselves must do the think-
ing, the construction, and the development of the theme, then deliver
it in their own words in a simple, straightforward manner.     Wherever
they have occasion to quote, proper credit must be given to the source
of the information.

                         A New Year Greeting
       The Improvement Era has received the Granite Wireless, number
one,   volume, 2, 1915, a little four-page publication issued by the
Mutual Improvement Associations of the Granite Stake of Zion. It
is full of encouragement to the members of our organizations
                                                              and of