Dr. LaRonika Thomas is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Theatre and Dance at Washington College. She completed her PhD at the University of Maryland, researching performances of urban planning, cultural space and cultural policy, and the role of art and culture in 21st century Chicago. Her chapter “Temple-Swapping in the City: The Spatial Imaginary and Performances of Place-Making in the Work of Theaster Gates” is included in the book Makeshift Chicago Stages: A Century of Theatre and Performance, published by Northwestern University Press. Her essay, “Digital Dramaturgy and Digital Dramaturgs” is included in The Routledge Companion to Dramaturgy. She was the 2016 recipient of the ATDS Graduate Student Travel Award for her paper “Toward a Civic Dramaturgy: Performances of Urban Planning in Chicago from Daniel Burnham to Theaster Gates.”She was the Visiting Assistant Professor in the Department of Theatre and Dance at Washington College for three semester in 2022-2023 and the Visiting Assistant Professor of Theatre at Loyola University Maryland for the 2017-2018 year, and has also taught courses at Towson University, MICA, Purdue University, Indiana University, the University of Maryland, and the Community College of Baltimore County. LaRonika also serves as the LMDA Liaison for Association for Theatre in Higher Education’s (ATHE) Dramaturgy Focus Group (DRFG).A professional dramaturg, producer, and writer, LaRonika worked in arts education, literary management, and dramaturgy in Chicago and in the Baltimore/DC area before returning to school for her doctorate. She has worked in various capacities with the Goodman Theatre, the Public Theater, Chicago Shakespeare Theatre, Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company, Center Stage, The Playwright’s Center, The Neo-Futurists, and Writers’ Theatre, among others. Her work has been funded by LMDA, the University of Maryland, and the City of Chicago. Specialties: Civic Dramaturgy, New Play Development, Production Research, Literary Management, Script Reading and Analysis, Script Consultation, Story Structure, Research Methods, Constructing Visual Dramaturgy Experiences and Lobby Displays, Performing Arts Consultation, Public Speaking Consultation, Theatre Productions, General Historical Research, Writing, Editing and Reviewing.