Copyright Guidance on ETD

This guide focuses on guidance for obtaining copyright permission and citation guidelines for using your previously published articles in your dissertation or thesis. You will also need to check if an image, figure, data, survey, instruments etc. are copyright protected before planning to use in the dissertation.  We recommend you schedule an appointment with a Research & Learning Librarian for this process.  

What is Copyright?

Copyright is a form of legal protection grounded in the U.S Constitution for original works of authorship.

Should I care about copyright while using figures, articles, and other materials in the my dissertation?

Yes! If a work is copyrighted, someone else cannot copy that work without permission. Read more information from Copyright.gov

What is fair use, works in public domain, and Creative Commons license?

• Fair use allows the use of copyrighted works without permission under certain conditions and circumstances such as educational, research, scholarship, non profit use etc. Read more on factors involved in Fair Use
• The public domain works are copyright free, it has no restrictions to use. Works before 1923, facts, data  etc. are examples.
• Creative Commons license facilitates authors custom license for using their works. Example include CC-BY. You must provide attribution to the original author.