Gena Corea
Since 1998, Gena Corea, certified by the Focusing Institute of New York, has faciliated Focusing and other inner growth workshops for men serving long terms in a New England prison. At this prison in 2000, she originated the now-annual Thanksgiving “Table in the Clearing.” This is a practice in which prisoners and guests welcome home exiled parts of the self.
In Vermont at Geryunant, Gena has a private practice guiding clients in Focusing and teaching them the process. For clients dealing with chronic and other illnesses, Gena often combines Focusing with sabuhalla, a hands-on form of healing. She practices sabuhalla also during extended stays in the village of Abene, Senegal, West Africa, where she has worked for a number of years with a local doctor.
Gena is the author of three books published by HarperCollins. The New York Times Book Review selected two of these books, The Hidden Malpractice and The Invisible Epidemic, for its Notable Books of the Year lists.
Of the later book, Library Journal wrote: "Sure to be a classic like Randy Shilts’ And the Band Played On."
Corea’s The
Mother Machine was published in Japan, Germany and Britain as well as in the United States. Artist Judy Chicago integrated quotes from The Mother Machine into The Holocaust Project, a visual exploration of the meaning of the Holocaust for contemporary people.
Discussing her books, Gena Corea has appeared on more than 250 television and radio programs, including the Today show, Donahue, and Fresh Air with Terry Gross. She has been featured in film documentaries including High Tech Babies on the PBS Nova series; On the Eighth Day: Perfecting Mother Nature, a Canadian film; in Germany, Und Mit Geistesstarke Tu Ich Wunder Auch, and Bucherjournal III; and, in 2006, in France with When Men Are Pregnant.
Gena has given speeches and media interviews throughout the U.S. and Europe and in Brazil, Bangladesh, Nicaragua, Australia and South Africa. These speeches were subsequently published as chapters in some 21 books.
African dance, Tai Chi and Continuum are the movement forms for which Gena feels most passion. Gena, who began training in African dance in 1990, teaches a beginners’ class in which attention is paid to the healing chi generated during African dance.
In 2003, Gena originated the annual Abene African Dance and Drum Festival in Southern Vermont featuring Senegalese choreographer Caro Diallo.
Gena has performed West African dance in shows in Massachusetts in such venues as Club Passim, Harvard Square, Bookcellar Café, Naked City Café, the Dance Complex, and Massachusetts Institute of Technology (all in Cambridge) and at Babson College in Wellesley.
In Vermont and New Hampshire, Gena performed with Caro Diallo’s dance troupe at Boccelli’s-on-the-Canal, Bellows Falls, Vt; Neumann Hall, Putney, Vt; the Stone Church, Brattleboro, Vt; and Keene State College, N.H. In Ziguinchor, Senegal, Gena performed with Diallo and his Black Soofa dance company in 2002, 2003 and 2005 and 2009.
