The Graduate School
Publish an Electronic Version of Your Dissertation
Publishing your electronic dissertation involves depositing an electronic copy of your work with someone who can make it accessible to the public. The number of outlets through which you can publish your work changes through time. Individual universities may also have specific requirements for publication. They also vary in such features as cost, accessibility, and implications for future publication possibilities of the same material.
At this time, doctoral students at The University of Texas are required to submit the dissertation (publishing requirement) in PDF format to Proquest/UMI, then turn in their other required documents to the Office of Graduate Studies (see the forms required and links on the online student forms page).
Publishing:
Proquest/UMI
Accepted Dissertation Formats: PDF (produced
with Adobe Acrobat software)
Web Address: http://www.il.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/
Author Information: http://www.il.proquest.com/en-US/products/dissertations/submitted_authors.shtml
Key Features:
- Largest source of dissertation abstracts in the world -- your work becomes part of a web searchable international database (If your university subscribes to Proquest you may login to access the database at Digital Dissertations)
- Royalty fees of 10 percent paid in any year that royalties exceed $10
- Copyright registration services available
- FREE electronic access to your work for UT community
- NOT available to general web search engines (Yahoo, Alta Vista, etc.)
- Publication restrictions available (including delayed publication)
UMI, University Microfilms International (UMI), now a division of Proquest, currently publishes 98-99% of all dissertations in the United States. UMI makes a microfilm copy of every dissertation for archival purposes. UMI is now also producing an electronic version of dissertations, which will be accessible on their web site. The first twenty-four pages of these dissertations can be accessed for free by anyone; further downloads must be purchased. UMI will still be paying author's royalties on these downloads in cases where orders have exceeded the annual minimum indicated on the publishing agreement made with the author.
At The University of Texas at Austin (UT), dissertations published through UMI will be available in their entirety in electronic format for free to people who use the UT Austin General Libraries.
Publishing agreements with UMI allow for restrictions for sales and access of dissertations. For example, the author may request that the dissertation not be accessible for a period of time; or that copies of the dissertation may only be sold with the author's permission. Dissertation Abstracts are published by UMI in Dissertation Abstracts International, a major research tool. UMI also regularly distributes subject segments of its Dissertation Abstracts database to various professional societies that maintain specialized information resources.
UMI submits a copy of the dissertation to the Library of Congress as is required for publication. UMI also, for a fee, is willing to register the copyright to the dissertation for the author. UMI has a "doomsday clause" with the Library of Congress, which means that if UMI is ever dissolved or goes out of business, the Library of Congress will receive all of its assets, including the dissertations.