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A great deal of highly specialized scholarship is never formally published
and appears only as a thesis or dissertation. While recent U.S. and Canadian
dissertations and theses are easy to locate -- thanks to centralized control
at UMI/Proquest -- older dissertations, master's theses, and foreign dissertations
can be difficult to find. Even when you can identify a dissertation that you
want to read, it is not always possible to obtain a copy. Keeping that in mind,
here are some tools that will help you identify and locate copies of theses and dissertations
from U.S. and non-U.S. colleges and universities.
Princeton dissertations
The University Archives holds two copies of most Princeton dissertations, one
in Mudd Library and one in Annex A. For dissertations written from 1989 to the
present, search the Library's Main Catalog for "Princeton University. Dept.
of History" as author; for earlier, try a keyword search for "history
and thesis and princeton." A card file and a local database at Mudd may
help in locating theses that are obscure or missing in the Main Catalog. For
more information, see Princeton
University Doctoral Dissertations.
U.S. and Canadian dissertations
For many years, UMI/Proquest has microfilmed U.S. and Canadian dissertations
and sold microfilm and print copies to libraries and scholars. Since 1997, they
have also made digital versions available online to institutions that subscribe
to Proquest Digital Dissertations (which used to be called Dissertation Abstracts International). The DAI database extends back to 1861 and represents the work of authors
from over 1,000 North American graduate schools and European universities. Some
60,000 new dissertations and 12,000 new theses are added to the database each
year. Those published from 1980 forward also include 350-word abstracts, written
by the author. Citations for master's theses from 1988 forward include 150-word
abstracts.
DAI can be searched by topic, by school & department, or by adviser (starting
with 1989). Use the Advanced Search interface, and be inventive. The subject
indexing is extremely general, and the keywords are drawn from the title and
abstract, or are those provided by the author, so they can be very inconsistent.
To see which schools are included for a particular country, use the Advanced
Search, School Index, and search by the name of the country, e.g. "france."
If you request a US dissertation through Interlibrary Loan, generally they
will purchase it from UMI for the library. (Dissertations that are not held
by UMI, e.g. Harvard dissertations, are more difficult to obtain.) Canadian
dissertations can be obtained through ILL from the National Library of Canada
on microfiche. Canadian theses are indexed in Theses Canada from 1965, with full text from 1998.
Dissertations written elsewhere
The best guide to the many printed catalogs and lists of dissertations is Reynolds'
Guide to theses. It is arranged by country of origin and by topic.
Reynolds, Michael M. Guide to theses and dissertations: an international
bibliography of bibliographies. Rev. and enl. ed. Phoenix, AZ: Oryx Press,
1985.
General and Humanities Ref. (DR): Ready Reference Z5053.A1 R49 1985
Note that you can often find printed bibliographies by searching the Main Catalog for
Dissertations, Academic [Country]
CRL's
Foreign Doctoral Dissertations Database
Coverage of non-U.S. dissertations in DAI is sketchy, and it can be difficult
to identify and obtain copies of foreign dissertations. However, the Center
for Research Libraries actively collects foreign dissertations and provides
them to member institutions through interlibrary loan. Unfortunately, their
collection is not completely indexed in the Foreign Doctoral Dissertations Database,
so if you need a foreign dissertation that isn't listed there, it's well worth
making an interlibrary loan request for it anyway. Please allow extra time --
if the dissertation you need is already at CRL, it will come quickly, but if
they need to purchase it, it may take six months to a year.
British dissertations
The Index
to theses with abstracts accepted for higher degrees by the universities of
Great Britain and Ireland and the Council for National Academic Awards replaces a printed index and covers British theses and dissertations
from 1716 through the present; the database includes Irish theses as well. Most British doctoral dissertations are available
through the British Library's British Thesis Service. In general, Interlibrary
Loan staff can easily obtain British dissertations from the BL, generally in
microform. You may also be required to complete a "Thesis Declaration Form"
before the BL ships the thesis to Princeton. See
British Thesis Service for more information.
German dissertations
The printed Deutsche Nationalbibliographie, which listed
dissertations in Reihe C Dissertationen und Habilitationscchriften and Reihe
H Hochschulschriften, must now be supplemented with online searching in the Deutsche Bibliothek's online catalog. (The older volumes of the Deutsche Nationalbibliographie are now housed in Annex A, and the
last 5 years are in the reference room in Firestone at Z5055.G29 D478.) For digital dissertations in German, see Dissertationen Online. Our Interlibrary Loan staff can obtain copies of many German dissertations
through CRL, but the process frequently takes several months and can take longer,
so plan accordingly.
French dissertations
Recent French dissertations are listed in Système universitaire de documentation [SUDOC], which is provided
by L'Agence bibliographique de l'enseignement supérieur. A project to provide
digital theses is underway. To find theses only, use the "Recherche avancée"
form and limit to "theses." Older French dissertations are listed in:
Catalogue des thèses et écrits académiques.
Firestone Library (F) Z5055.F79
C37
Library has: 1884/85-1939, 1941-1959, 1934-1959 bound as part of Bibliographie
de la France, 1937-1960 (0406.358)
which was continued by:
Catalogue des thèses de doctorat soutenues devant les universités françaises.
Z5055.F79 C37 Location Has: 1965, 1967-1978
Z5055.F69 I59 Location Has: 1981-1991
Italian dissertations
Try Tesionline.
Spanish dissertations
Dissertations completed since 1976 are indexed in Bases de datos de tesis doctorales
Tips on obtaining copies of dissertations
- If the dissertation you need is in DAI and was completed in 1997 or later,
you can obtain a PDF of the full text. From the citation, click on "Free
Download" and then follow the instructions.
- To borrow a dissertation through Interlibrary Loan, use the Thesis request
form online. Please allow plenty of time -- some dissertations are easy to obtain
and arrive quickly, but others may take months.
- To purchase a copy of a dissertation for yourself, simply use the order form
on UMI's web site.
- To request that Princeton purchase a copy of a dissertation for the library,
contact the History Librarian at the address below.
Dissertations in progress
The American Historical Association maintains a list of dissertations in progress at
http://www.historians.org/pubs/dissertations/.
The list is provided by history departments annually, so it may not be complete, but it's a useful starting
point.
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