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Using a comma between all the items in a series, including the last two, avoids this problem. This last commathe one between the word and and the preceding wordis often called the serial comma or the Oxford comma. In newspaper writing, incidentally, you will seldom find a serial comma, but that is not necessarily a sign that it should be omitted in academic prose.
According to the MLA Handbook for Writers of Research Papers (7th edition), properly citing borrowed words and ideas, including those from dictionaries, is necessary in order to avoid plagiarism, which can have serious consequences, and to lend credibility to your writing overall.