Greil Marcus, the acclaimed Berkeley-based rock critic, cultural historian, and New School visiting professor, was named a Chevalier des Artes et Lettres by the French government. Pierre-Francois Mourier, consul general of France in San Francisco, presented the award to Marcus at a private ceremony on February 11, 2008.

Greil Marcus is one of the most widely read and highly respected American intellectuals in France. His book Lipstick Traces was published in France in 1998 to great acclaim, both among the public and in the press. The book, an exploration of rebellion in the twentieth century, discusses a number of modern French intellectual and artistic movements from Dada to the Lettristes. Other books by Marcus that have been published in France include Mystery Train, Like a Rolling Stone, and, most recently, L’Amerique et Ses Prophetes.

Last semester, Marcus was a visiting professor in The New School’s Riggio Writing and Democracy Honors Program, where he taught The Old Weird America: Music as Democratic Speech—from the Commonplace Song to Bob Dylan.