R. Shanea Williams currently lives in Queens, New York. She graduated from the University of Virginia in 2003 with a BA in English and received her MFA in dramatic writing (with a concentration in screenwriting) from New York University in 2008. Williams was a quarterfinalist in the 2007 Slamdance Screenwriting Competition, and in 2011, she was a top 5 screenplay finalist in the Urbanworld Film Festival Screenwriting Competition. Contamination is her second short film.