Barbara Lesley Brookes MNZM FRSNZ (born 1955) is a New Zealand historian and academic.

[3] Brookes was offered a post-doctoral scholarship at Otago and a permanent position in the university's Department of History in 1983.

In 1986, Brookes and her colleague Dorothy Page introduced the first university-level women's history paper in New Zealand.

The society said that Brookes' research "has contributed to a vast international expansion of the historical canon from the 1970s, particularly in relation to the history of gender.

[9] In the 2018 New Year Honours, Brookes was appointed a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services to historical research and women.