Carrissa Villacorta - Author of book "Surreality" and known at New York

by Manila TImes
Filipina’s big harvest of
international writing awards


CARISSA VILLACORTA, the 27-year-old author of the book Surreality, garnered four Communicator Awards, including an Award of Excellence for the copy/writing of Surreality. “The Communicator’s prestigious Award of Excellence is presented to those entrants whose ability to communicate makes them the best in their field.” The other three were Awards of Distinction for her column of the same title in Philippine News, a US circulated newspaper; for the cover article “From Far Away to Broadway” for Filipinas Magazine, February 2007, also circulated in the US, and the Surreality book. “The Award of Distinction is given to projects that exceed industry standards in production or communication skills.” The Communicator Awards is an international awards competition that recognizes outstanding work in the communication field according to their official letter of announcement. The book was published by the UST Publishing House in celebration of the school’s 400th anniversary.

The New-York based Villacorta, together with her creative director John Paul Su of JPSU Multimedia Productions, also received two Platinum Hermes Creative Awards as author of the book and as writer and executive producer of its promotional video. “The Hermes Creative Awards is an international competition for creative professionals involved in the concept, writing and design of traditional materials and programs, and emerging technologies, administered and judged by the Association of Marketing and Communication Professionals, consisting of several thousand members. Hermes award makers are the same makers of the Golden Globes.

Earlier, Villacorta received 3-bronze Telly Awards for her Surreality video in three categories—Excellence in Low-Budget Productions, Promotional Pieces and Promotional Music Video. “The Telly is an international award-giving body which honors the best in film and video productions.” Telly award makers are the same makers of the Oscars and Emmys.

Carissa was most recently a featured speaker at the Mensa Society of Greater New York, to discuss some themes of Surreality. With over 50,000 members, American Mensa is the largest national Mensa operating under the auspices of Mensa International Ltd. To qualify for Mensa, members must have scored in the top 2 percent of the general population on an accepted standardized intelligence test.

She became the youngest Distinguished Service Honoree for Excellence in Community Service in the 43-year history of Philippine New York Junior Chamber of Commerce’s Distinguished Service Awards. She was also honored for Outstanding Achievement in Contemporary Literature at the Crowne Plaza Hotel, New York.

Villacorta also holds the distinction of being the first Filipino author to launch at a Borders bookstore in the United States. Carissa works at the community and cultural section of the Philippine Consulate General in New York and writes as a hobby on personalities, events and places in New York.