Straight News: Gays, Lesbians, and the News Media - Softcover

Alwood, Edward

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0231084374 ISBN 13: 9780231084376

Publisher: Columbia University Press, 1998

Synopsis

How far have the American media come in providing fair, responsible coverage of lesbian and gay issues? Former CNN reporter Edward Alwood presents an insider's view of the changing fortunes of lesbian and gays in American print and broadcast media.

About this title

Review

Edward Alwood's history of how journalism has treated gays and gay issues shows a remarkable progress from the time when a gay man appeared on television with a hood over his head to protect his identity. The crucial turning point was that watershed in the history of gay rights, the Stonewall riots in Greenwich Village, when drag queens found themselves taken seriously at last after a night spent fighting the police. Alwood relates how the descheduling of homosexuality as an illness by the American Psychiatric Association forced a reassessment upon a reluctant media establishment, and how the onset of the AIDS epidemic sparked genuine empathy, and the emergence of gay liberation within the newsrooms.

About the Author

Edward Alwood, a former CNN correspondent, writes for a variety of publications, including The Christian Science Monitor.

Edition details

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Publication date: 1998
• ISBN 10: 0231084374
• ISBN 13: 9780231084376
• Binding: Paperback
• Language: English
• Number of pages: 368