The University of Derby holds a CLA (Copyright Licensing Agency) licence which permits staff to make multiple copies of extracts from books and journals owned by the Library for use by students or by lecturers in the course of teaching. The usual restrictions on amount will still apply, i.e. 5% or one whole chapter or journal article. You are permitted to make a copy for every student on the course and one for yourself as lecturer.
Inspection, proof or pre-publication copies supplied to you by publishers for review or on a sample basis cannot be copied, as these are not considered 'published' material. The licence does not cover copies made from your own personal library, unless the Library also owns its own copy, or the book in question is unavailable on the retail market, new or second-hand, and is not within the British Library's collection.
The CLA licence applies primarily to books and journals. Certain materials are excluded under the terms of this licence; these include printed music (including the words), maps and charts, newspapers, workbooks, work cards or assignment sheets, unpublished material, and any publication expressly excluded from the CLA licence by the publisher. You can find a list of publishers and countries excluded from the CLA licence at the CLA page here.
Some materials that are excluded from the CLA licence are governed by separate licences held by the University. See NLA Licence for newspapers.
If you wish to copy material that is not covered by the CLA or any other licence held by the University, or you wish to copy more than the limits allowed under these licences, permission will need to be sought from the copyright owner. The Senior Copyright Officer can advise you on this.
Under copyright law, you are usually permitted to copy:
However, this is simply a rough guide. For personal research and study there is a 'fair dealing' exception under copyright law. Fair dealing includes copying a non-substantial amount of copyright work for private research or study; and using copyright material for criticism, review and news reporting.
Unfortunately these concepts are not clearly defined - 'substantial' refers to both quality and quantity. Half of a book would be substantial, one chapter would not. A small selection of text may count as substantial if, for example, it gave away key plot points in a novel. There is also no clear definition of what counts as criticism and review - using a copyright image to illustrate a point may not count, but analysing a photograph or diagram might.
The above amounts may be considered a general rule of thumb - you have to decide for yourself what you would consider a 'fair' amount. Obviously, copying an entire book or journal to save buying it would not be fair!
No, theses are classed as unpublished works, and are usually treated under fair dealing provisions, i.e. a 'reasonable' amount may be copied. 'Reasonable' is not defined under copyright law, but is generally considered as anything under 50% of the overall work.
You may be able to request a complete electronic copy of a thesis from the British Library's ETHOS service, or, if it is a recent University of Derby thesis, an electronic copy may be stored on UDORA.