| Code | DS/UK/559 |
| Person Name | Barker; Martin (20 Apr 1946-8 Sep 2022); Lecturer, writer, researcher, campaigner |
| Dates | 20 Apr 1946-8 Sep 2022 |
| Dates and Places | Born 20 Apr 1946 in Essex, United Kingdom to Edith ne Veitch and Fred Barker, a glass designer.
Attended Bancrofts School, Woodford Green, London.
1967 Bachelors in Philosophy from the University of Liverpool;
1995 Doctorate in Philosophy University of West England. |
| History | Martin Barker was born in Essex in April 1946. After studying Philosophy in Liverpool, he went on to teach at then Bristol Polytechnic later known at the University of West England in the Philosophy of Social Science, later renamed Cultural Studies. During his time at the University of West England, he developed a course with Anne Breezer and Jean Grimshaw, helping shape and develop the course and department of Cultural Studies. During the 1970s, Barker was part of the International Socialists group. He remained a lifelong socialist. Throughout his career, Barker was interested in audiences, censorship, philosophy and sociology. |
| Activity | Barker's career:
1969-1998, Lecturer in Philosophy of Social Sciences, later renamed Cultural Studies, at Bristol Polytechnic, which in 1992 was renamed the University of West England. Barker was appointed Head of the School of Cultural Studies.
1998-2001, Reader in Media Studies at the University of Sussex.
2001, Appointed a Professor in Film and Television, in the Department of Theatre, Film and Television Studies at the University of Wales, Aberystwyth, which in 2007 became Aberystwyth University.
2003, Barker co-founded Participations, an online open access journal.
2011 Retired from Aberystwyth University as an emeritus professor. |
| Published Works | 1981 The New Racism: Conservative and the Ideology of the Tribe. In which Barker coined the phrase new racism about public discourse about immigration during the government of Margaret Thatcher
1984 A Haunt of Fears The strange history of the British horror comic campaign.
1984 The Video Nasties: Freedom and Censorship in the Arts
1989 Comics: Ideology, Power and the Critics
1990 Action: The Story of a Violent Comic
1992 Reading into Cultural Studies
1996 The Lasting of the Mohicans: History of an American Myth
1997 Ill Effects: the Media-Violence Debate. Revised second edition published 2001
1998 Knowing Audiences: Judge Dredd, its Friends, Fans and Foes
2000 From Antz to Titanic: Reinventing Film Analysis
2001 The Crash Controversy: Censorship Campaigns and Film Reception
2002 Kicked into the Gutters: or, 'My Dad doesn't read comics, he studies them', International Journal of Comic Art, 64-77
2003 Contemporary Hollywood Stardom
2003 Assessing the "quality" in qualitative research: the case of text-audience relations, European Journal of Communication
2003-2004 Barker served as Director on a Economic and Social Research Council funded international audience research project on The Lord of the Rings
2004 'News, Reviews, Clues, Interviews and Other Ancillary Materials – a Critique and Research Proposal', Scope: on-line Film Studies Journal
2007 Watching the Lord of the Rings: Tolkien’s World Audiences
2007-2008 Barker was commissioned by the British Board of Film Critics to research audiences and issues about watching sexual violence on screen. This resulted in Audiences and Receptions of Sexual Violence in Contemporary Cinema
2011 A ‘Toxic Genre’: the Iraq War Films
2012 Crossing Out the Audience, Audiences
2013 Live to Your Cinema
2015 Alien Audiences: Remembering and Evaluating a Classic Movie
2016 Introduction: The World Hobbit Project, Participations
2021 Watching Game of Thrones: How audiences engage with dark television. |
| Relationships | Anne Beezer, Collaborator and colleague, An inquiry into Lord Scarman on Brixton: Report on a Disorder, Reading into Cultural Studies, since 1970s |
| Source | Martin Barker obituary, by Rosie Barker. Accessed January 13, 2026. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/nov/28/martin-barker-obituary
Participations volume 19, issue 9, November 2023. Accessed January 13, 2026. https://www.participations.org/19-03-14-smith.pdf
Emeritus Professor Martin Barker. Accessed January 13, 2026.
https://www.aber.ac.uk/en/development/alumni/obituaries/obituary-profiles/martinbarker/
Kicked into the Gutters: or, 'My Dad doesn't read comics, he studies them'. Accessed January 23, 2026.
https://pure.aber.ac.uk/ws/portalfiles/portal/100320/ComicsPiece |