Astra Taylor

**Astra Taylor** (born 1979) is a Canadian-American documentary filmmaker, writer, activist and musician.

## Life

Born in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Taylor grew up in Athens, Georgia, and was unschooled until age 13 when she enrolled in ninth grade. At 16 she abandoned high school to attend classes at the University of Georgia, which she only stayed at for a year before heading to Brown University. She attended classes there for a year and dropped out when she realized that "unschooling" was a lifelong commitment. Taylor has taught sociology at the University of Georgia and SUNY New Paltz. Her writings have appeared in numerous magazines, including Dissent, n+1, Adbusters, The Baffler, The Nation, Salon, and The London Review of Books.

Taylor is the sister of painter and disability activist Sunny Taylor, and is married to Jeff Mangum of Neutral Milk Hotel. She joined Neutral Milk Hotel onstage for a number of shows in 2013 and 2014, playing guitar and accordion. She is a vegan. She lives in New York.

## Activism

Taylor was active in the Occupy Movement and was the co-editor of Occupy!: An OWS-Inspired Gazette with Sarah Leonard of Dissent magazine and Keith Gessen of n+1. The broadsheet covered Occupy Wall Street in five issues over the course of the first year of the occupation and was later anthologized by Verso Books. She was also a founder of Rolling Jubilee, a Strike Debt project, which to date has relieved $39 million in debt since 2011 by crowd-sourcing funds and purchasing debt.

## Works

### Films

* *Zizek!*, 2005
* *Examined Life*, 2008

### Writing

* *Examined Life: Excursions with Contemporary Thinkers* (editor), The New Press, 2009, ISBN 9781595584472
* *Occupy!: Scenes From Occupied America* (co-editor), Verso, 2012, ISBN 9781844679409.
* *The People's Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age*, Henry Holt and Company, 2014, ISBN 9780007525591.

## Projects

* http://www.hiddendriver.com/
* http://rollingjubilee.org/

## Notes

1. ↑ Tortorici, Dayna, ed. (2013), "Group three", *No Regrets: Three Discussions*, Brooklyn, New York, p. 71, retrieved 2014-12-30
2. ↑ http://www.hiddendriver.com/about Astra Taylor's official bio, accessed February 8, 2009
3. ↑ "Interview with Unschooled Filmmaker, Astra Taylor" by Michelle Drew for CitizenShift: Media for social change
4. ↑ "The Unschooled Life: Astra Taylor's Story". *PopularResistance.Org*. 2014-01-16. Retrieved 2017-04-24.
5. ↑ "Authors: Astra Taylor". *Dissent Magazine*. Retrieved 14 February 2016.
6. ↑ "Astra Taylor - Authors". *n+1*. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
7. ↑ "Astra Taylor". *Adbusters*. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
8. ↑ "Astra Taylor - The Baffler". *The Baffler*. Retrieved 2016-03-06.
9. ↑ "Author Bios: Astra Taylor". *The Nation*. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
10. ↑ "Astra Taylor". *Salon.com*. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
11. ↑ "Astra Taylor". *The London Review of Books*. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
12. ↑ http://www.freewilliamsburg.com/january\_2002/sunny.html "Sunny Taylor", Free Williamsburg, accessed February 8, 2009.
13. ↑ http://www.gloriousnoise.com/articles/2008/jeff\_mangum\_married.php Article from Glorious Noise, accessed February 8, 2009.
14. ↑ Jarnow, Jesse. "Neutral Milk Hotel's First Show in 15 Years Was Ragged, Glorious". Spin.com. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
15. ↑ "Jeff Mangum Benefit for WFAS". Woodstock Farm Animal Sanctuary. October 28, 2011. Retrieved June 14, 2016.
16. ↑ Taylor, Astra (2014). *The People's Platform*. New York.
17. ↑ "Read Our New Gazette". *n+1*. Retrieved 2016-03-06.
18. ↑ "VersoBooks.com". *www.versobooks.com*. Retrieved 2016-03-06.
19. ↑ Taylor, Astra (2015-02-27). "A Strike Against Student Debt". *The New York Times*. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2016-03-06.
20. ↑ Dougherty, Sally (December 2009). "Book Review Examined Life: Excursions with Contemporary Thinkers edited by Astra Taylor.". *Theosophy Northwest*. Theosophy Northwest. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
21. ↑ "Occupy!: Scenes from Occupied America". *VersoBooks.com*. Retrieved 26 October 2014.
22. ↑ Wu, Tim (July 18, 2014). "Content and Its Discontents". *The New York Times*. Retrieved 2 September 2014. “The People’s Platform” should be taken as a challenge by the new media that have long claimed to be improving on the old order. Can they prove they are capable of supporting a sustainable cultural ecosystem, in a way that goes beyond just hosting parties at the Sundance Film Festival?

## Some attributes

### Third

*Unknown*

* Official website
* Astra Taylor on Internet Movie Database
* Sarah Leonard (June 4, 2014). "Can the Internet Be a ‘People’s Platform’? A Q&A With Astra Taylor". *The Nation*.
* "Astra Taylor on The People’s Platform: Taking Back Power and Culture in the Digital Age". *Harper's*. August 7, 2014.
* Elisabeth Donnelly (April 17, 2014). "Everyone On the Internet Needs to Read ‘The People’s Platform': An Interview With Astra Taylor". *flavorwire*.

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