Rate My Professor Simon Barber

Dr. Simon Barber is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Social, Gender Studies and Criminology at the University of Otago. He is a scholar of Indigenous thought and politics, Marxist and critical theory, black studies, communism, and conjunctions thereof. Barber earned his Master's degree from the Centre for Cultural Studies at Goldsmiths, University of London, his doctorate from the Centre for Research Architecture at Goldsmiths, and a Postgraduate Diploma in Ahunga Tikanga (Māori Laws and Philosophy) from Te Wānanga o Raukawa in Ōtaki. His doctoral thesis, "Geometries of Life" completed in 2018, examines the ongoing colonial encounter between Māori and Pākehā worlds in Te Waipounamu, integrating concepts from both university and wānanga learning. His research interests include Indigenous theory, Marxism, critical theory, settler colonial studies, postcolonial theory, and social theory.

Prior to his current position, Barber held the Te Tomokanga Postdoctoral Fellowship in Sociology at the University of Auckland, where he taught an undergraduate course on colonisation and social justice and coordinated the Critical Theory Network. He co-edited the book "Through That Which Separates Us" (2021) with Miri Davidson, addressing themes of deportation, incarceration, and colonialism. Barber also co-edited a Special Issue of New Zealand Sociology (2022, Vol. 37, Issue 1) with Sereana Naepi, exploring how Māori and Pacific scholars transform the social sciences. Notable publications include "Māori Sovereignty or Death" (2023, Decolonization of Criminology & Justice, 5(1), co-authored with A. Rata and G. Brayne), "In Wakefield's Laboratory: Tangata Whenua into Property/Labour in Te Waipounamu" (2020, Journal of Sociology), "Sociology in a Crisis: Covid-19 and the Colonial Politics of Knowledge Production in Aotearoa New Zealand" (2020, co-authored with S. Naepi), and "Māori Mārx: Some Provisional Materials" (2019, Counterfutures). He serves as a researcher for Economic and Social Research Aotearoa and sits on the executive committee of the Māori Association of Social Sciences.