About Me

Sabrina Cartan is a fan activist, writer, and award-winning digital strategist who specializes in mobilizing online fan communities for social justice and civic causes. Sabrina is the Director of Digital Strategy at Potomac Productions, where she mobilizes and inspires fan communities to engage with issues such as women’s rights, LGBTQ+ equality, ending voter suppression, and climate justice. Sabrina’s work on the intersection of fandom and politics has been published in the Journal of Transformative Works and Cultures. She is also the host and producer of Fandom Made Me, a podcast from Fandom Forward featuring conversations with activists, celebrities, media leaders, and writers about the pop culture that shaped them. Sabrina is a sought-after expert on fan activism and has hosted panels and workshops at conferences and organizations including Netroots Nation, San Diego Comic-Con, Flame Con, Tisch College for Civic Life at Tufts University, and the Institute for Study Abroad.

Sabrina has over a decade of professional experience and leadership in digital strategy, public relations, marketing, social media, and federal telecommunications policy. At a boutique PR firm, she worked with renowned clients such as the United Nations, Amnesty International, LionTree, and notable authors such as Soraya Chemaly, Pat Mitchell, and Professor Martha S. Jones. In 2022, Sabrina won two Shorty Awards for her creative direction on Clean Creatives’ The F-List Awards “For Your Consideration” campaign. The campaign was also featured as AdWeek’s “Ad of the Day.”

A member of many fandoms, Sabrina is an avid Gilmore Girls fan who blogs for Remarkist, a fan community app and ecosystem co-founded by Gilmore Girls actor John Cabrera. Her earliest work on fandom was a paper she wrote in 5th grade about why Lorelai Gilmore was a great fictional heroine (she wishes she still had a copy of it).

Hailing from a mixed race, working class family in Rochester, New York, Sabrina began her career in media as a college volunteer for Fandom Forward (formerly The Harry Potter Alliance), an international nonprofit organization that pioneered fan activism as we know it today. Sabrina currently serves as Co-President of Fandom Forward’s Board of Directors and previously served on the Associate Board of The LAMP, a media literacy nonprofit based in New York City.

Sabrina graduated from Tufts University in 2015 with a B.A. in Political Science and was inducted into the National Political Science Honor Society and the Honos Civicus Society for her dedication to American civic education. While in college, she interned for Congresswoman Katherine Clark, the Assistant Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and Vice Chair of the Democratic Caucus. As a proud Tufts alum, Sabrina enjoys volunteering as a mentor and group facilitator with the Tisch Summer Fellows, Tufts University’s annual public service internship program.

She lives in New York City with her husband, Brian, and their rescue Spanish greyhounds, Oliver and Frodo. You may recognize Sabrina and Brian from the time Jeff Goldblum crashed their wedding.

In her free time, Sabrina enjoys greyhound rescue advocacy, cooking #100newrecipes per year, performing stand-up comedy, long walks on the beach, and joking about clichés like “long walks on the beach.”

Headshot courtesy of Justin McCallum Photography