Pre-publication concerns

Making your thesis freely available on the Internet via ORA constitutes a form of publication which is likely to make it more difficult for you to get your thesis published in other ways you might have anticipated, eg in the form of a book or journal articles. You are likely to have to revise the work for publication in other forms much more substantially than might otherwise have been necessary. Publishers differ in respect to their policies on this issue, so you may wish to check the appropriate publisher’s (if known) policy.

On the other hand, it may be some years before articles you submit now will be published, and you can’t be sure that you will get a book contract. In the meantime, your work will have little visibility. Additionally, publishers are increasingly reluctant to publish books of theses. It may be better to get your thesis out into the public domain, and set to work developing it further or in a more general context for publication – or moving on to a second major publication project. In the case of journal articles, it should still be possible to publish material from your thesis if it is sufficiently further developed; journal editors should be able to give you advice on this.

Different levels of access can be set for e-theses. The options are:

  1. Open access (both record and full content freely available to anyone with Internet access)
  2. Restricted item (both record and full content inaccessible)
  3. Item record accessible (with or without abstract) to anyone with Internet access – full content inaccessible
  4. Partial open access - Item record freely available (with or without abstract) – sections of full content freely available to anyone with Internet access; for eg first chapter/first 20 pages/table of contents only made freely available to anyone with Internet access; some content inaccessible

You can set the time period for restricted access content

Students in the Humanities Division:

The Humanities Division strongly supports open access to and wide dissemination of theses produced by its students. However, during this period whilst both authors and publishers adapt to open access, the Division has agreed that by default, access to the full text of digital theses will be restricted for three years. Authors should indicate as such on the ORA online deposit form. These students need not apply for restricted access using form GSO3C. Authors can choose to override this default and make their thesis open access either at deposit or at any time during the three year embargo. Students who wish to make their thesis freely available on deposit or before the end of the three years should indicate as such on form GSO3A and on the online ORA deposit form. All students need to indicate if their thesis contains content where copyright is held by a third party. See the Humanities Division website at http://www.humanities.ox.ac.uk/graduate_study/current_students/ora/ for guidance.

Revision to procedures for access to theses in other academic divisions are currently under discussion. Further advice will be available soon. In the meantime, you may wish to discuss this matter with your supervisor or faculty Director of Graduate Studies.

Publishers' policies on prior-publication

American Chemical Society: considered on a case-by-case basis

Elsevier permits prior publication of an article as a thesis