Alice Echols is Professor of History, and the Barbra Streisand Chair of Contemporary Gender Studies, at the University of Southern California.^[1][2][3]

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]

While in graduate school at the University of Michigan, Echols visited the Rubaiyat, a since-closed^[4] predominantly gay bar where the "music just stunk." After persuasion from friends, she got a trial gig and then was hired, beginning her career as a Disco DJ.^[5]

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]

She authored Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America 1967-1975 (with foreword by Ellen Willis);^[6] 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.^[7] Her book Shortfall: Family Secrets, Financial Collapse, and a Hidden History of American Banking was published by The New Press on October 3, 2017.^[8]

She also wrote a chapter on the Women's Liberation Movement in William McConnell's book The Counterculture Movement of the 1960s.^[9]

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.^[10]

• Daring to Be Bad: Radical Feminism in America 1967-1975 (with foreword by Ellen Willis)^[6]
• Shaky Ground: The Sixties and its Aftershocks (2002)^[2]
• Scars of Sweet Paradise: The Life and Times of Janis Joplin (1999)^[11]
• Hot Stuff: Disco and the Remaking of American Culture (2009)^[2]