A Ghost Whisperer episode nominated.....along with Milk, True Blood, Torchwood, Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom, Freeheld, Transamerican Love Story, The Early Show, GQ, Countdown with Keith Olbermann, Kenneth Cole, Aquí y Ahora Among Nominees and Tyra Banks, Suze Orman to be Honored in New York.....

TOTAL NUMBER OF NOMINEES: 185
(125 English, 60 Spanish-language)

TOTAL NUMBER OF GLAAD MEDIA AWARDS CATEGORIES: 41
(26 English, 15 Spanish-language)

CRITERIA FOR NOMINATION:

GLAAD Media Awards nominees are selected by Nominating Juries using the following four criteria:

• Fair, Accurate and Inclusive Representations – Rather than portraying the LGBT community in broad stereotypes, the project deals with the characters or themes in a fair, accurate, and multi-dimensional manner.  Inclusive means that the diversity of the LGBT community is represented.

• Boldness and Originality – The project breaks new ground by exploring LGBT subject matter in non-traditional ways and handles the LGBT content in a fresh and original manner.

• Impact – The project has significant cultural impact.  The media project dramatically increases the cultural dialogue about LGBT issues, or reaches an audience that is not regularly exposed to LGBT images and issues.

• Overall Quality – A project of extremely high quality adds significance to the images and issues portrayed and draws more viewers or readers to the material.  Fair, accurate and inclusive images may be weakened when they are part of a poor-quality project.

FACTS ABOUT THE NOMINEES:

• Throughout 2008, the media focused on the issue of marriage equality and Proposition 8, the anti-gay ballot initiative to eliminate marriage for gay and lesbian couples in California.  Nominees covering these topics include the documentary Saving Marriage, "Don't Ruin My Gay Wedding" The Tyra Banks Show, "Ellen & Portia's Wedding Day" The Ellen DeGeneres Show, "Funding the Marriage War" In the Life, a multi-part series with George Takei and Brad Altman on The Early Show, "Special Comment: Prop 8" Countdown with Keith Olbermann, "Taking to the Streets" Good Morning America Weekend, and Alaine Griffin's "Gay Marriage Ruling Ended Long Journal of the Soul" in The Hartford Courant.

• Transgender lives and stories received significant attention in the media this year.  Nominees addressing the transgender experience include Ugly Betty, The L Word, "Tandem Repeats" ER, America's Next Top Model, I Want to Work for Diddy, Transamerican Love Story, "The Pregnant Man" The Oprah Winfrey Show, "Transgender Triumphs" and "Gays in the Ghetto" from The Tyra Banks Show, "Becoming" from WCAX-TV3 in Burlington, Vt., Born in the Wrong Body: All in the Family, Sex Change Hospital, Karen Lovett and Ashley Smith's "Special Report: In Transition" in The Telegraph [Nashua, N.H.], Daisy Hernández's "Becoming a Black Man" ColorLines, Ben Ehrenreich's "Death on Terminal Island" Los Angeles, and Maximillian Potter's "Second Nature" in 5280.

• The experience of LGBT people of faith is explored in Save Me, A Jihad for Love, "Don't Ruin My Gay Wedding" The Tyra Banks Show, Today's "Bishop in the Eye of the Storm," Bradley Campbell's "A New Wave of Gay Seminarians Prepares to Take the Pulpit" in the City Pages [Minneapolis, Minn.], Andrew Corsello's "Let God Love Gene Robinson" in GQ, "Our Mutual Joy" by Lisa Miller in Newsweek, and Mary Jordan's "Excluded Gay Bishop Reacts" on WashingtonPost.com.

• The Tyra Banks Show received three of five nominations for Outstanding Talk Show Episode.  These three nominations brings to seven the total number of nominations received by The Tyra Banks Show over the past three years.  Tyra Banks is also the creator of America's Next Top Model, nominated for Outstanding Reality Program.  And, Tyra Banks will be the recipient of this year's Excellence in Media Award at the New York event on March 28, 2009.

• Patrik-Ian Polk, the writer/director of Noah's Arc: Jumping the Broom, was also the writer/director of Punks, nominated for Outstanding Film - Limited Release at the 13th Annual GLAAD Media Awards in 2002.

• Torchwood, Reaper, True Blood, and Supernatural all received nominations, reflecting growing inclusion of LGBT characters in the science fiction/fantasy genre.

• ABC received six nominations, more than any other broadcast network.  The nominees appeared in the following categories: Outstanding Drama Series, Outstanding Comedy Series, Outstanding Individual Episode, Outstanding Daily Drama, Outstanding TV Journalism Segment.

• Logo and here!, networks with content created for the LGBT community, swept the Outstanding Television Movie category, taking all five nominations.

• Newsweek received more nominations for the 20th Annual GLAAD Media Awards than any other newspaper or magazine: one for Outstanding Magazine Article and one for Outstanding Magazine Overall Coverage, as well as two for Outstanding Digital Journalism Article and two for Outstanding Digital Journalism – Multimedia.

• Current nominees Brothers & Sisters, Ugly Betty, Kathy Griffin: My Life on the D-List, As the World Turns, The Oprah Winfrey Show, The New York Times, The Advocate, Levi's and AfterElton.com were all award recipients at the 19th Annual GLAAD Media Awards in 2008.

MULTIPLE NOMINEES:

Broadcast Networks [22 total]
ABC (6)
CBS (4)
The CW (3)
NBC (2)

Cable Networks [22 total]
Logo (5)
MSNBC (3)
BBC America (2)
HBO (2) [includes HBO Latino]
here! (2)

Production Companies
First Run Features (2)
Regent Releasing (2)

Television Shows
The Tyra Banks Show (syndicated) (3)

Newspapers & Magazines
Newsweek (2) / Newsweek.com (4)
The Washington Post (2) / WashingtonPost.com (1)
Los Angeles Times (2)
The Advocate (1) / Advocate.com (1)

Comic Book Publisher
DC Comics (3)

Advertiser
Kenneth Cole (2)