LibGuides: Library Search: Dissertations & Theses

UT Austin Dissertations & Theses

Dissertations and theses submitted at UT Austin can be found in the Library Catalog scope of the search interface. These include both the physical copies currently housed in storage (mostly before 2010) and electronic theses and dissertations (ETDs) that are available only online from our repository, Texas ScholarWorks. Most records for ETDs also include a summary of the work.

To look up a specific dissertation or thesis, you can find it quickly by entering the author's name and/or words from its title.
To look up dissertations by faculty supervisor, search the name of the faculty adviser as an Author, and refine by Resource Type=Dissertation. Note: the supervisor name has only been included as an added author in our bibliographic records since around 2001. In recent years we also include the name of the the degree-granting department.
If you're searching subject-related keywords, you can use the Resource Type facet to refine your results. Select both Dissertations and Manuscripts. (Most older hardcopy dissertations and master's theses and reports were cataloged as manuscripts.)

Note: It usually takes as much as a year after a degree is granted before the dissertation is cataloged and available to the public. If the student has placed an embargo on access, it won't be available for about three years after submission.

Texas ScholarWorks ETD Collection

Dissertations Worldwide

Millions of dissertations from around the world are indexed via ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global, which is included in the Articles & More scope of Library Search. Full text of many dissertations can be found via ProQuest (restricted to UT Austin users) or Open Access from various repositories.

To find these, do a search in the Articles & More section, and facet by Resource Type > Dissertations.

You can also search PQDTG database directly:

Dissertations and Theses Global
Unlimited users.
Updated monthly. Contains more than 2 million doctoral dissertations and master's theses. Provides full text for many dissertations and theses, including most done after 1997. All subject areas are covered. The database includes more than 90 percent of the doctoral dissertations accepted each year in North America with selective coverage for other parts of the world. Each dissertation published since July 1980 includes a 350-word abstract written by the author. Master's theses published since 1988 include 150-word abstracts. Only bibliographic citations are available for earlier years. More than 55,000 new citations are added to the database every year. Many dissertations from The University of Texas at Austin are included in the database, though theses from the University are only rarely included.