While at Barnard, Sobchack often frequented the nearby Thalia Theater, which offered up a diverse schedule of classic and foreign films.
She published some poetry and began work on a novel, but within two years of graduating moved into a career counseling college grads in search of their first jobs.
This led her to a new position, sponsored by President Johnson's Anti-Poverty Program, counseling troubled high school dropouts towards sustainable careers.
She remained in New York until 1966 when she relocated to Salt Lake City where her husband Thomas J. Sobchack had taken an Assistant Professorship in the English Department at the University of Utah.
On her trip back to her family in Utah, she visited the University of Southern Illinois-Carbondale, where she ultimately decided to pursue her Ph.D. the following year in the Department of Speech Communication, with an emphasis on Philosophy of Language.
While at Santa Cruz, along with pursuing her own research and writing, she served in a number of administrative capacities including becoming the first Dean of the Arts Division and effectively helping to establish the university's Film Studies curriculum.
She can be seen delivering commentary, for example, on the bonus features of Dark City, Buffy the Vampire Slayer (Season 7) and Warner Bros. Tough Guys set of DVDs.