Presently Barry's main research interest is student attitudes to the study of commercial law and the role legal ethics has in preparing students for commercial practice.  Barry is also interested in demistifying the study of commercial law, and the depiction of lawyers in popular media.

Barry Yau teaches in the GDLP (PLT) online program at the ANU School of Legal Practice (formerly ANU Legal Workshop). Since joining ANU full-time in 2012, Barry has convened Commercial Practice, as well as Consumer Law, with the support of a dedicated team of talented legal practitioner/mentors based across Australia. Before joining ANU Barry worked as a lawyer in government and private practice for 13 years, including a stint as an Australian Volunteer Abroad lawyer in Papua New Guinea. Barry also spent several years in the UK where based at the University of Warwick, he worked as the Project Manager of the SAFE Project, which was funded with a 12 million euro grant from the European Union, to research the implementation of routine and cost-effective non-invasive prenatal diagnosis.

Since 2013, Barry has been leading a longitudinal research project that follows a sample of law students and early career commercial lawyers.  As part of this qualitative research, Barry is exploring themes of wellness and work-life balance, along with the the factors, forces and choices shaping life, family and career paths.

Barry’s research interest has stemmed from his teaching of Commercial Practice in the University’s professional legal training program. One goal of his research is to develop an in-depth understanding of attitudes to continuously improve in preparing students for commercial and corporate legal practice. Barry also integrates his research with his teaching through commercial blogs to his students to provide a vibrant learning environment.  Barry also blogs for the ANU School of Legal Practice on topics such as attitudes to commercial law, work life balance, resilience, pop culture and legal ethics in corporate culture.

Barry was the recipient of the ANU College of Law 2020 Citation for Outstanding Contribution to Student Learning.

Since 2014, Barry has been leading a longitudinal research project that follows a sample of law students and early career commercial lawyers.  As part of this qualitative research, Barry is exploring themes of wellness and work-life balance, along with the the factors, forces and choices shaping life, family and career paths.

Refereed publications

• Barry Yau and David Catanzariti. 'At Play in the Field of Dreams: Theorising Attitudes, Perceptions and Practices of Law Students in conjunction with the Reflections of Early Career Commercial Lawyers.' (2020) Law in Context 37(1) 114
• Barry Yau, ‘The creeping corporatisation of consumer guarantee remedial relief: Implications of Australian Competition and Consumer Commission v LG Electronics Australia Pty Ltd on the Australian Consumer Law’, (2019) Competition and Consumer Law Journal 27(1) 54.
• Barry Yau, 'Reshaping the teaching-research nexus: Connecting with students through research blogging (with an autoethnographic perspective) before they become lawyers', (2020) The Law Teacher 54(2) 261
• Barry Yau, David Catanzariti, Joanne Atkinson, 'The Information Gap: A comparative study of the paradigms shaping perceptions of career success for law undergraduates and professional legal training students in Australia and the latent implications of non-professional legal career opportunities for law graduates in England' in Rachael Field and Caroline Strevens (eds) Educating for Well-Being in Law, 2019. https://www.taylorfrancis.com/books/e/9781351104401
• Barry Yau and David Catanzariti, 'Bridging the Information Gap', (June 2018), Law Institute Journal 40
• Barry Yau, '"What’s Ethics got to do with it?’ Requiring students to be cognisant of ethical parameters in commercial practice',  (2013) 6 (1-2) Journal of the Australasian Law Teachers Association 11

Conference, panel and seminar presentations

• Barry Yau, ‘Revitalising the study of Commercial Law: contractual negotiations, a legal ethical dilemma and a dose of cupcakes’, Association of Law Teachers Annual Conference, March 2013, Nottingham, UK.

• Barry Yau and Vivien Holmes, ‘What’s ethics got to do with it? Requiring students to be cognisant of ethical parameters in commercial practice’, Australasian Law Teachers Association Annual Conference, October 2013, Canberra.

• Barry Yau, ‘Attitudes towards Commercial Law: From Undergraduate Law Students to Early Career Commercial Lawyers – Preliminary Observations on three Focus Group Proceedings’, Australasian Law Teachers Association Annual Conference, July 2014, Bond University. 

• Barry Yau and Alexandra Johnstone, ‘Focus grouping attitudes towards commercial law in three legal communities, comparing attitudes of professional legal training students to those of undergraduates and early career commercial lawyers’, Australasian Professional Legal Education Council Annual Conference, November 2014, Auckland, New Zealand.

• Barry Yau, Panel member, Teaching session, Corporate Law Teachers Association Annual Conference, January 2015, University of Melbourne.

• Barry Yau and Alexandra Johnstone, ‘Attitudes towards the study and practice of corporate and commercial law – from undergraduate law students to early career commercial lawyers’, Corporate Law Teachers Association Annual Conference, January 2015, University of Melbourne.

• Alexandra Johnstone and Barry Yau, ‘Predictions,  perceptions and premonitions of law students about commercial law practice and work-life balance compared and contrasted with reflections, recollections (and some regrets) of early career commercial lawyers’, Association of Law Teachers Annual Conference, March 2015, Cardiff, UK. 

• Barry Yau and Alexandra Johnstone, ‘Complicities: A snapshot of the narratives driving lawyer career choice and work life balance based career decisions’, ANU College of Law Research in Progress seminar, December 2015, Canberra.  

• Alexandra Johnstone and Barry Yau, ‘The narratives that drive us: lawyer career choice and work life balance’, Law, Literature and the Humanities Association of Australia Annual Conference, December 2015, UTS.

• Barry Yau and Alexandra Johnstone, ‘Bridging the information gap in the law school environment: improving student wellness and identities within their narratives’, Wellness for Law Forum, February 2016, Sydney

• Barry Yau and Alexandra Johnstone, ‘Collaboration through collection of research data: key consideration of attitudes to commercial law and focus by research participants on work life balance and wellness as primary narratives’, Association of Law Teachers Annual Conference, March 2016, Newcastle-upon-Tyne, UK. 

• Barry Yau, ‘Bridging the information gap in the law school environment: improving wellness for PLT students as they prepare for commercial practice in a “top firm”’, Australasian Professional Legal Education Council Annual Conference, November 2016, Brisbane.

• Liz Curran, Judith Harrison, Pamela Taylor-Barnett and Barry Yau, ‘Reflective Practice in Practical Legal Education: its rationale, benefits and challenges’, Australasian Professional Legal Education Council Annual Conference, November 2017, Melbourne.

• Barry Yau, ‘Reshaping the teaching-research nexus: A lecturer blogs his research to his students before becoming lawyers’, ANU College of Law Research Seminar Series 14 August 2019.

• Barry Yau, 'On the edge: subversivelyreshaping the teaching-research nexus to connect with students through research blogging before they become lawyers’, Legal Education Research Conference, UNSW, 27-28 November 2019.

• Barry Yau, 'The (a)synchronous semester: Reflections of asynchronous teaching online, synchronous on-campus teaching, and virtual synchronous teaching with references to Netflix, theatre and cinema', ANU NECTAR research webinar series, 25 June 2020.