DUMAS metadata for French Master students' electronic dissertations

In DUMAS dissertations from Master students are made available by the librarians of the institution of higher education where the thesis was defended. Furthermore, a minimum grade is necessary – officially 16/20 – in order to screen for the quality of the archived manuscripts. In late 2023, the archive hosted 52.787 documents : Master theses, Medicine, etc. Some of them dated back to the 1940s, but their existence is mostly anecdotical, since the archive gained momentum in the late 2000s. While DUMAS is the largest archive for electronic dissertations in France, specialized sites have also been created alongside for certain disciplines; we can for example mention the TRHAA database, (Research Dissertations in Art History of Art and Archaeology), maintained by the National Institute of Art History. This is a notable difference with doctoral dissertations, which are all centralized in France on the theses.fr site.

In France, Master students’ dissertations overall contribute only moderately to the advancement of scientific knowledge, due to failure to be published in scientific journals, or even to be archived properly. However, in the case where the work carried out is of quality, these writings are likely to provide interesting insights into their subject of study. Among other advantages, students produce this work within the timeframe of an academic year, and often tackle current topics and quickly propose initial avenues for reflection, literature reviews, which can then be possibly further explored by experienced researchers. In fact, a few months to a year pass between the choice of a research topic and the submission of te dissertation, which allows greater responsiveness to current themes. In contrast, the production cycle of a research article is measured in years. Furthermore, beyond their personal qualities, students theoretically benefit from the supervision of an experienced researcher, who adds added value to the writing in which they invest.

Hardly any research has been carried out on the topic, which is why we made this dataset available.