Alice Echols
American historian
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Alice Echols is Professor of History, and the Barbra Streisand Chair of Contemporary Gender Studies, at the University of Southern California.[1][2][3][4] Much of Echols' work explores the transformative period of the "long Sixties" between the 1950s to the mid-1970s.[5] Her research bridges the cultural gap between scholarly history and popular culture. [6]She draws from her own personal history as a disco DJ as a student and maps societal shifts and influence of counterculture on the mainstream with a feminist perspective.[7]
University of Michigan
University of Southern California
Alice Echols | |
|---|---|
Alice Echols, 2011 | |
| Academic background | |
| Alma mater | Macalester College, University of Michigan |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | History |
| Sub-discipline | Contemporary Gender Studies |
| Institutions | Rutgers University, University of Southern California |
Education
Echols received her bachelor's degree from Macalester College, Minnesota in 1973. She obtained her master's degree and Doctorate at the University of Michigan in 1980 and 1986 respectively.[2]
Career
While in graduate school in Ann Arbor at the University of Michigan, Echols visited the Rubaiyat, a since-closed[8] predominantly gay bar where the "music just stunk." [9] After persuasion from friends, she got a trial gig and then was hired, beginning her career as a Disco DJ.[10]
Echols has been a professor of history at the University of Southern California since 2004. Since 2011 she has been the Barbra Streisand Professor of Contemporary Gender Studies, an endowed professorship. Echols was a visiting associate professor at Rutgers University during the 2009–2010 academic year.[2]
Honors and awards
| Honor or Award | Date |
|---|---|
| Rackham Dissertation Grant, The University of Michigan | 1984 |
| Center for Gender Research Fellowship | 1985 |
| University Fellowship, The University of Michigan | 1986 |
| The Horace H. Rackham Distinguished Dissertation Award, The University of Michigan | 1987 |
| ACLS Grant-in-Aid Fellowship | 1990 |
| Gustavus Meyers Outstanding Book Award-Daring to Be Bad | 1990-1991 |
| General Education Course Innovation Award | 2006-2007 |
| USC Endowed Professorship, Barbra Streisand Professor of Contemporary Gender Studies and Professor of English, Gender Studies and History | 2011-2016 |
| USC Endowed Professorship, Barbra Streisand Professor of Contemporary Gender Studies | 2016- |
Source:[2] | |
Publications
Echols authored Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America 1967-1975 (with foreword by Ellen Willis);[11] Scars of Sweet Paradise: The Life and Times of Janis Joplin; Shaky Ground: The Sixties and Its Aftershocks; and Hot Stuff: Disco and the Remaking of American Culture.[12] Her book Shortfall: Family Secrets, Financial Collapse, and a Hidden History of American Banking was published by The New Press on October 3, 2017.[13]
She also wrote a chapter on the Women's Liberation Movement in William McConnell's book The Counterculture Movement of the 1960s.[14]
Echols was also interviewed in the 2012 documentary, The Secret Disco Revolution, where she emphasized the political nature of disco and its role in Black, queer, and women's liberation.[15]
In 2026, Echols published, Black Power, White Heat: From Solidarity Politics to Radical Chic, a publication exploring cross-racial alliances in the freedom movements of the 1960s.[16]
Selected bibliography
- Black Power, White Heat: From Solidarity Politics to Radical Chic (2026)
- Shortfall: Family Secrets, Financial Collapse, and a Hidden History of American Banking (2017)
- Hot Stuff: Disco and the Remaking of American Culture (2009)[2]
- Shaky Ground: The Sixties and its Aftershocks (2002)[2]
- Scars of Sweet Paradise: The Life and Times of Janis Joplin (1999)[17]
- Pleasure and Danger: Exploring Female Sexuality By Alice Echols, Amber L. Hollibaugh, Linda Gordon, et al.(1992)
- Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America 1967-1975 (with foreword by Ellen Willis) (1990)[11]
