I will be completing a masters degree within the next couple of years with the intent of being able to find a job that I can do in the comfort of my own home, courtesy of the internet. I am guessing, however, that much of the land that does not even come with a utility pole is not likely to have internet - at least, high speed internet. Are there work arounds for this? Are there maps that I can get - either paper kind or online - that will show me the location of this valuable infrastructure?

If you are far enough off grid, satellite may be your only option.
We have several members here on the Hughes Sat network.
Perhaps one of them will chime in with the pros/cons.

I travel a lot off the high speed internet grid, but my web design business and permaculture related publishing business requires that I'm still able to connect to the internet on a regular basis. I use the mobile personal hot spot option on my iphone a lot sometimes even from remote wilderness areas with a cell signal: http://support.apple.com/kb/ht4517.

If you need a regular download and upload capabilities and don't have access to high speed cable or DSL internet, you'll probably want a Hugh's Net satellite type solution.

You can get service area maps from the various telecom companies, but that won't tell you where they actually have cable run. Without having a specific property in mind it is difficult to find out where the actual infrastructure is. The companies are not going to share their asset inventory GIS databases with people outside their company. I have gotten portions of these maps/databases as a part of my job when designing water/wastewater system improvements that could potentially conflict - even then it is not a easy thing to get.

I would try to figure out where you want to be first. Perhaps find out how much satelite internet costs (in $ and hassles) vs. typical DSL so you can determine how much of a factor being off-grid would be. Also take a close look if telecommuting is realistic for your anticipated career. The company I work for has several people tele-commuting. All of these people spent several years in the office before doing so and had proven themselves to be good employees. We would never hire someone and allow them telecommute from the start. You might have to start out self-employed if telecommuting is a must...

1. define your requirements:
How fast of a connection do you need?
voice/video or data only?
mainly downloading things, or do you need to upload files also?

3g/4g is your best option imo, a person hot spot or similar seems to be the easiest nowadays as it is built into most smartphones (or you can DL an app to do it)
followed by short wave wireless (mini microwave towers), but these have to be line of sight, and also slow down an more people access the link. (these are the ~10in square antennas seen on rural homes)
satellite is ok, but would be hard for me to work from home with. there is ~1 sec delay (an eternity in network time) that cant be overcome due to the satellite hop.
dial up - pretty much a no go

depending on your pay and some other things, you may be set up a small tower on a rural property and get a better/faster microwave setup. this wouldnt be cheap, but they are pretty reliable.

hope this helps.

Depends on far from a major city you want to be for cable/DSL. I know people who lived just outside the largest city Albuquerque who finally got cable internet. They were using dial-up prior to that. Phone dial-up is pretty good even for rural areas. Cell phone service and internet depends on the carrier, Verizon tends to be the largest/strongest followed by T-mobile and lastly Sprint. I use Credo (a Sprint provider) and will not get a strong signal places even in the largest city Albuquerque.

I have heard of people paying for their own fiber runs for high speed internet for their secluded mountain resort/mansion/casino.

Satellite connection via a service like Hugh's net is a viable option. I've also run my my web design business of of 3G wireless internet is totally doable if you have the patience.

A lot of it depends on your upload and download requirements. For example I would not want to upload one of my organic gardening / permaculture video courses via a satellite connection or 3G, but I will happily build websites from a remote homestead or campground from such a set up.

It really depends... The satellite services out where I am will sell a "bigger" package at a higher monthly cost for business users but I don't know if it is actually any faster at downloading. There is recently some optical lines installed along some of these rural hiways so if you are not too far off the main roads that might be available. Like Brett said anything is possible for a price. The cell phone service depends on who's tower is nearest you. Where I am only Verizon will guarantee connectivity - in line of sight with their tower - but most often I am only 1x service though occasionally it goes to 3G (my "old" droid phone). On the other side of the mountains of the mining area is a Sprint tower so people over there use that. There is Cable/DSL in the town proper so if you needed that faster service you would probably not live out here 30 miles from town.

Most towns and communities have some cable and DSL service but it may not extend very far into the "back woods." Satellite can reach anywhere and if your needs can be timed to the lower use periods and you don't mind a higher bill they can probably serve you. Isn't the phone basically a satellite connection through the cell tower rather than the orbiting sat. so would depend on the company and where you set yourself? In the Silver City/Deming corner if you required really fast internet, you would live in the town area. You can still be out side the main bustle and get cable services.

I am interested in what you decided.