PATRICK LONERGAN has been appointed as NUI Galway’s first professor of drama and theatre studies. His focus will be to develop new courses, build research resources, and partner with theatre companies.
Describing his appointment as “a great honour”, Prof Lonergan said one of his goals will be to make the university “recognised as a world leading centre” for the study of Irish theatre.
“We have achieved an enormous amount in the area of drama and theatre studies at NUIG already,” he said. “Our aim is to build on those achievements, so students and researchers will recognise NUIG is the best place in the world to study Irish drama.”
Prof Lonergan has written about Irish theatre for The Irish Times and Irish Theatre Magazine. His book, Theatre and Globalisation: Irish Drama in the Celtic Tiger won the 2008 Theatre Book Prize. More recently he published The Theatre and Films of Martin McDonagh with Bloomsbury in London.
He runs the annual JM Synge Summer School in County Wicklow, is a former theatre assessor for the Arts Council, and is a Board Member of Irish Theatre Magazine and the Baboró International Arts Festival for Children.
