diss.

Writing & Everyday abbreviation · Citation and Bibliography

diss.
Stands forDissertation
CategoriesWriting & Everyday

diss. stands for Dissertation, a citation and bibliography abbreviation.

Identifies a doctoral dissertation or thesis in a citation, followed by the university and year, as in "PhD diss., Yale University, 2018." It distinguishes unpublished theses from published books.

Example: Nguyen, Linh. "Water Rights in the Mekong Delta." PhD diss., University of Washington, 2018.

Usage notes

APA writes "[Doctoral dissertation, University Name]" and names the database, such as ProQuest Dissertations and Theses. In British usage "thesis" usually refers to a doctorate and "dissertation" to a shorter master's or undergraduate project, roughly the reverse of American usage. MLA spells out "dissertation."

More citation and bibliography abbreviations

  • bibliog. – Bibliography
  • bk. – Book
  • ch. – Chapter
  • CMOS – Chicago Manual of Style
  • col. – Column
  • comp. – Compiler
  • DOI – Digital Object Identifier
  • ed. – Edition
  • eds. – Editors
  • enl. – Enlarged
  • f. – And the following (page)
  • ff. – And the following (pages)

See all 58 citation and bibliography abbreviations →

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