Editor · Translator · Writer
Sarah Michelle
Cohen
Nonfiction editor and translator working in English, Arabic, and Spanish. Based in Connecticut, working in the New York City area and internationally.
Editor · Translator · Writer
Nonfiction editor and translator working in English, Arabic, and Spanish. Based in Connecticut, working in the New York City area and internationally.
Sarah Michelle Cohen is a nonfiction editor, translator, and writer. Her academic background is in religious studies: she has a BA from Bard College, where her thesis examined self-disclosure through the work of the Sufi philosopher Ibn Arabi, and an MA from Columbia University, where she researched sensory experience in the early modern cityscapes of Ottoman Aleppo and Damascus.
Sarah's editing work covers academic manuscripts, policy texts, institutional reports, and long-form nonfiction, with particular depth in the humanities and social sciences. She has edited texts used in capacity development training by international government agencies, and previously held a position at the Museum of Food and Drink in Brooklyn. She currently teaches English to adult learners at the Ferguson Library and serves as a Moderator at local polling sites.
Along with editing the text of works, Sarah is proficient in the work that goes into publishing a book. She has worked on typesetting and publication-ready work using tools like Affinity and Adobe InDesign.
As a translator, Sarah works between English, Arabic, and Spanish. She has also translated literary and academic texts.
She edits academic books and articles, policy documents, institutional reports, and long-form nonfiction manuscripts. She works at both the structural and line level, and is comfortable with dense or technical material — particularly in the humanities, religious studies, philosophy, and social policy.
She is available for manuscript assessments, full developmental edits, and copy editing. For international clients and organisations, she has experience working on texts that cross cultural and linguistic contexts, and on documents intended for policy or government audiences.
She also does audio narration for educational content and e-learning modules.
She translates between English, Arabic, and Spanish. Her translation practice has been primarily in legal, medical, and civic settings, with close attention to register and the weight of specific word choices — particularly in contexts where accuracy carries real consequences for the person the document concerns.
She has also worked on literary and academic translations, and brings the same care to the difficulty of finding equivalents that carry the same meaning, tone, and cultural specificity as the source text.
Enquiries about availability for translation projects are welcome.
She writes poetry and performs spoken word. She also keeps a blog with close readings and commentary on poems, mostly by women writers who are less widely known than they should be. Her chapbooks and zines are free to download.
She is available for editing, translation, and narration projects, including international commissions. The best way to reach her is by email.
She is also happy to be contacted about her own writing, about her blog, or about translation and Arabic literature more generally.