Antolini honored for WFCR series on transgender issues

WFCR reporter Tina Antolini is the winner of a Gracie Award for her three-part series “Voices of the Transgender Community of Western Massachusetts” that aired last August.

The series profiles several transgender residents in western New England, their lives and transitions from one gender to another. It then turns to the transgender community’s struggles to pass civil rights legislation in Massachusetts and Connecticut.

The Gracie Awards are presented annually by the American Women in Radio and Television (AWRT) to honor exemplary programming created for women, by women and about women. The AWRT recognizes the best in radio, television, cable and new media.

“Voices of the Transgender Community in Western Massachusetts” is being honored in the outstanding series category. The award will be presented on June 4 in New York City.

“After the first New England Trans Pride March was held in Northampton last June,” said Antolini, “I decided this was a community that the general public hadn’t heard enough about ... For many, the idea that there could be a diversity of genders is a new and startling one. And so, instead of just reporting a story about the effort to pass anti-discrimination legislation, I decided we really needed to hear about the lives of the people behind that effort, in order to fully understand it. What evolved was several first person narratives about the experience of growing up feeling as if you were in the wrong body, deciding to transition to another gender and the challenges and triumphs that have come since.”

More Information

Listen to the series

March 27, 2009.

E-mail story to a friendPrinter-friendly version

/more people/