{{short description|Writer and academic}} {{Infobox person | honorific_prefix = | name = <!-- include middle initial, if not specified in birth_name --> | honorific_suffix = | image = File:Sara Marcus author photo June 2010.jpg | image_size = <!-- DISCOURAGED per WP:IMGSIZE. Use image_upright. --> | alt = | caption = Marcus in June 2010 | native_name = | native_name_lang = | pronunciation = | birth_name = <!-- only use if different from name above --> | birth_date = <!-- {{birth date and age|YYYY|MM|DD}} for living people supply only the year with {{Birth year and age|YYYY}} unless the exact date is already widely published, as per WP:DOB. For people who have died, use {{Birth date|YYYY|MM|DD}}. --> | birth_place = | other_names = | citizenship = | education = | alma_mater = Oberlin College<br>Columbia University<br>Princeton University | occupation = Writer, academic | years_active = | era = | employer = University of Notre Dame | organization = | agent = <!-- Discouraged in most cases, specifically when promotional, and requiring a reliable source --> | known_for = ''Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution'' | notable_works = <!-- produces label "Notable work"; may be overridden by |credits=, which produces label "Notable credit(s)"; or by |works=, which produces label "Works" --> | style = | movement = Riot Grrrl | awards = | website = <!-- {{URL|example.com}} --> }}
'''Sara Marcus''' is a writer and musician best known for her 2010 book ''Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution.'' She began her writing career as a participant in the riot grrrl movement, writing zines as a teenager in Washington, DC. She subsequently worked as a journalist, writing about music and politics. In 2018, she earned a PhD in English at Princeton University and is an assistant professor of English at the University of Notre Dame.
== Early life == Marcus began writing in the format of self-published zines in 10th grade,<ref name=":0">{{Cite news|url=http://www.nassauweekly.com/an-interview-with-sara-marcus/|title=An Interview with Sara Marcus|last=Leifer|first=Joshua|date=2015-03-28|work=Nassau Weekly|access-date=2017-08-04|language=en-US}}</ref> first as part of the riot grrrl movement in and around Washington, D.C.<ref name=":1">{{cite news|url=https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2010-oct-10-la-ca-sara-marcus-20101010-story.html|title=Book Review: 'Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution' by Sara Marcus|last1=McDonnell|first1=Evelyn|date=10 October 2010|work=Los Angeles Times|access-date=26 July 2017}}</ref> and then through her first year of college, where she also worked on student publications.<ref name=":0" /> She spent three semesters as an undergraduate at Yale, then transferred to Oberlin,<ref name=":0" /> where she graduated in 1999.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://oberlinreview.org/4092/arts/on-the-record-author-sara-marcus-oc-99/|title=On the Record: Author Sara Marcus OC '99|last=Rothbaum|first=Beatrice|date=April 22, 2011|website=The Oberlin Review|language=en-US|access-date=2017-08-04}}</ref> She next earned an MFA in nonfiction writing from Columbia University. In 2012, she began graduate studies in the English Department at Princeton.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://english.princeton.edu/people/sara-marcus|title=Sara Marcus {{!}} Department of English|website=english.princeton.edu|language=en|access-date=2017-07-27}}</ref> Marcus is queer; she came out during her freshman year of high school.<ref>{{cite web|url=https://thenewjournalatyale.com/2010/12/riot-girl/|title=Riot Girl|last=Rappaport|first=Emily|website=The New Journal|date=December 11, 2010|access-date=January 18, 2025|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111203162027/https://thenewjournalatyale.com/2010/12/riot-girl/|archive-date=December 3, 2011|url-status=live}}</ref>
== Career == Marcus's 367-page book ''Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution'' was published by Harper Perennial in 2010.<ref>{{cite news|url=http://www.avclub.com/review/sara-marcus-igirls-to-the-fronti-45784|title=Sara Marcus: Girls To The Front|last1=Wernecke|first1=Ellen|date=30 September 2010|work=The A.V. Club|accessdate=26 July 2017}}</ref><ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.bitchmedia.org/post/from-the-library-girls-to-the-front-the-true-story-of-the-riot-grrrl-revolution-0|title=From the Library: Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution|last1=McAllister|first1=Ashley|date=October 1, 2010|work=Bitch Media|accessdate=26 July 2017|language=en}}</ref> The project was initially born of Marcus's concern for the way the history of the movement had been chronicled in media, reduced to a mere fashion trend or even a joke, sidelining the central political concerns and getting it "wronger and wronger" as years passed.<ref name=":2">{{Cite news|url=https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/city-hall/story/2010/09/in-girls-to-the-front-the-blueprint-of-a-neverending-girl-riot-000000|title=In 'Girls to the Front,' the blueprint of a neverending girl riot|last=Reagan|first=Gillian|date=September 28, 2010|work=Politico|access-date=2017-08-04}}</ref> When she heard a male journalist was considering writing a book on the movement, Marcus felt an urgency about giving her own account to ensure "somebody who knew what they were talking about [would get] it out there...before someone who didn't know what they were talking about got to it first and distorted the story."<ref name=":2" /> Through personal activist and musical connections developed both during the Riot Grrrl years as well as later, Marcus had access to major figures of the movement, including Kathleen Hanna, Nomy Lamm, Ananda La Vita, Molly Neuman and Allison Wolfe.<ref name=":2" /> In Flavorwire, Jason Gross said, "Few people could have provided such a comprehensive, insider's view of the movement as [Marcus] did."<ref>{{cite news|url=http://flavorwire.com/180036/33-women-music-critics-you-need-to-read/5|title=33 Women Music Critics You Need to Read|last1=Gross|first1=Jason|date=16 May 2011|work=Flavorwire|accessdate=26 July 2017}}</ref> Marcus left her full-time job and enrolled in Columbia's MFA program to pursue the project, then completed it during two stays at the MacDowell Colony.<ref name=":2" />
Reviewing the book in the ''Los Angeles Times'', Evelyn McDonnell says Marcus's book "Riot Grrrls' raw, emo agit-pop with a poetic fervor that matches its subject," though close to her subject—Marcus and McDonnell both were participants in the movement—McDonnell suggests Marcus "chronicles the brief-lived rebellion's sometimes nasty downward spiral with perhaps too much sympathetic regret."<ref name=":1" /> In ''Bookforum'', Johanna Fateman of Le Tigre wrote, "In passionately describing Riot Grrrl's radical propositions as the youth movement that formed the sharper edges of both feminism's third wave and '90s punk rock, Marcus argues powerfully that it's a spirit of urgency and confrontation still needed in the feminist struggle for girls' lives."<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.bookforum.com/inprint/1703/6325|title=Her Jazz|last=Fateman|first=Johanna|date=September–November 2010|work=Bookforum|access-date=2017-08-04|language=en-US}}</ref>
Marcus writes about politics, books and music and was published in ''Bookforum'', ''The San Francisco Chronicle'', ''The Los Angeles Review of Books, Artforum, Slate, Salon,'' ''The Philadelphia Inquirer'', ''The Forward.'' She was politics editor for five years at ''Heeb'' magazine. Her poetry has appeared in ''Death'', ''Encyclopedia'', ''EOAGH'', ''Tantalum'', and ''The Art of Touring''.<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://newbooksnetwork.com/sara-marcus-girls-to-the-front-the-true-story-of-the-riot-grrrl-revolution-harper-perennial-2010/|title=Sara Marcus, "Girls to the Front: The True Story of the Riot Grrrl Revolution" (Harper Perennial, 2010) {{!}}|website=newbooksnetwork.com|language=en-US|access-date=2018-07-22}}</ref>
Marcus earned a PhD in English from Princeton University in 2018.<ref>{{Cite web|title=Sara Marcus *18 {{!}} Interdisciplinary Doctoral Program in the Humanities|url=https://ihum.princeton.edu/people/sara-marcus-18|access-date=2020-12-30|website=ihum.princeton.edu}}</ref> Her first academic book, ''Political Disappointment: A Cultural History from Reconstruction to the AIDS Crisis,'' examining the expression and uses of disappointment in American literature, music and activism, was published by Harvard University Press in 2023. She is an assistant professor in the English department of the University of Notre Dame.
==References== {{reflist|30em}}
==External links== * [https://www.harpercollins.com/9780061806360/girls-to-the-front ''Girls to the Front''] at HarperCollins * [https://www.hup.harvard.edu/catalog.php?isbn=9780674248656 ''Political Disappointment''] at Harvard University Press * [http://www.washingtoncitypaper.com/news/blog/13135919/author-sara-marcus-who-wants-a-senator-with-pubic-hair Sara Marcus interview] by Moe Tkacik in the Washington City Paper {{authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Marcus, Sara}} Category:21st-century American LGBTQ people Category:American political writers Category:American queer musicians Category:American queer writers Category:American writers about music Category:Columbia University School of the Arts alumni Category:Feminist musicians Category:LGBTQ feminists Category:Living people Category:Oberlin College alumni Category:LGBTQ people from Washington, D.C. Category:Riot grrrl musicians Category:Year of birth missing (living people) Category:Writers from Washington, D.C.