Many congratulations to Professor Ruth Barton on her retirement.
On 09 December 2025, the School of Creative Arts held a symposium on Irish Film Studies in the Trinity Long Room Hub in honour of the retirement of Professor Ruth Barton, who joined the Department of Film at Trinity in 2007. Professor Barton was elected as a TCD Fellow in 2018 and was Head of the School of Creative Arts 2019-2022.
Professor Barton’s main research area is Irish cinema, in which she is a global expert and for which she was elected to the Royal Irish Academy in 2021. Her reputation has been achieved via the publication of several influential monographs, notably Irish National Cinema (Routledge, 2004) and Irish cinema in the twenty-first century (Manchester University Press, 2019). Other significant work focuses on diasporic filmmaking and filmmakers: Screening Irish-America (Irish Academic Press, 2009); Acting Irish in Hollywood (IAP, 2006); Rex Ingram: Visionary Director of the Silent Screen (University of Kentucky Press, 2014). Professor Barton is also the author of the critical biography, Hedy Lamarr, the Most Beautiful Woman in Film (UKP 2010).
Current research projects include a critical biography of Maureen O’Sullivan, the Irish actress who became a Hollywood star (most memorably as Jane in the Tarzan films). Professor Barton has recently branched out into cultural policy, partly as a result of being awarded funding under the Creative Ireland Programme to complete the study, Ecologies of Cultural Production (report published 2019), on career construction in Film, Television and Theatre.
As well as academic publication in this field, Professor Barton currently sits on the editorial board of the Irish Journal of Arts Management and Cultural Policy and is an invited member of the Regional Screen Production Network. She continues her public outreach through regular radio appearances (Arena, RTÉ) and writing for mainstream publications such as The Irish Times and The Conversation.
The symposium brought together internationally recognised scholars in the field of Irish film and media studies. The influence of Professor Barton’s scholarship on the diverse range of topics discussed was clear, including the history of Irish and Northern Irish cinema, current production, distribution, and exhibition practices and policies, women and the Irish film industry, and questions of national, cultural, and social representation. Professor Barton’s keynote address, ‘Irish Film Studies in the 21st Century’, was an expansive and insightful consideration of the discipline’s past, present, and future. The symposium was followed by a reception in the Samuel Beckett Theatre Foyer, where Professor Barton celebrated the occasion with colleagues, friends, and family. The events were generously supported by the Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences Events Fund, and the School of Creative Arts, Trinity College Dublin.
Please click here for further information on the symposium.