1993/1994 academic year she was Preceptor of the Institute of Advanced Study and Research in the African Humanities at Northwestern University in Illinois, United States. In 1999, she was Melville Herskovits Distinguished Visiting Professor at Northwestern University. In 2014, she was the Mellon Foundation Distinguished Visiting Scholar at the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa. Barber has held senior positions with the British Academy, the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and the social sciences. She was a member of the council from 2007 to 2008, and was its Vice-President (Humanities) from 2008 to 2010. Research Barber is a cultural anthropologist, whose research has remained focused within the area in which she did her doctorate. She specialises in the "Yoruba-speaking area of Nigeria" (the Yoruba people), and their culture, religion, and oral and written literature. She has also looked comparatively at "popular culture across sub-Saharan Africa" and researched the "uses of literacy in colonial Africa". As part of broader research interests, Barber teaches undergraduate and postgraduate courses on the popular culture of Africa, African religion and ritual, and also teaches the Yoruba language at beginner level. Personal life Barber's partner is Paulo Fernando de Moraes Farias. He is a historian of medieval West Africa. Honours In 2003, Barber was elected a Fellow of the British Academy (FBA), the United Kingdom's national academy for the humanities and social sciences. She was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2012 New Year Honours for services to African studies and Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE) in the 2021 New Year Honours for services to the study of African culture. In 1991, Barber was awarded the "Amaury Talbot Prize for African Anthropology" by the Royal Anthropological Institute for I Could Speak Until Tomorrow: Oriki, Women and the Past in a Yoruba Town, her first book. In 2001, she was awarded the "Melville J. Herskovits Award" by the African Studies Association for The Generation of Plays: Yoruba Popular Life in Theatre. In 2009, she was awarded the "Susanne K. Langer Award for Outstanding Scholarship in the Ecology of Symbolic Form" by the Media Ecology Association for The Anthropology of Texts, Persons and Publics. In 2013, she was awarded the "Paul Hair Prize" by the African Studies Association for Print Culture and the First Yoruba Novel. Selected works References 1949 births Living people British anthropologists