Also nabbing highly prized Peabodys for 2011: HBO's Treme, PBS's Austin City Limits and, winning a second award, Comedy Central's The Colbert Report...

The awards, bestowed by the University of Georgia's Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication, are, as always, a bold and thoughtful condensation of the best that's out there in electronic news and entertainment. Radio and TV documentaries, entertainment programs, even websites all get honored for overall excellence.

The Peabody voters like to be ahead of the curve, which sometimes has them going out on a lib as well. Portlandia, for example, may be a critical and nerd darling, but I'm not sure the sum of its parts -- at this point -- adds up to Peabody-level work.

Honoring Homeland after its inaugural season, on the other hand, is the sort of astute home run that characterizes most Peabody choices. What a great show -- and what a great show of faith, for the Peabody folks to recognize it after only one season of solid writing and, by Claire Danes and Damian Lewis, fabulous acting.

And even giving a Peabody to the syndicated series Jeopardy!, after all these years, makes sense somehow. In a year when man was pitted against machine on that venerable quiz show, and machine kicked ass, a Peabody award seems like a very human, maybe even humane, consolation prize.

Nonfiction winners included the PBS P.O.V. entry Perestroika, Japan's NHK documentary on Surviving the Tsunami, and Al Jazeera English, one of several winners for its comprehensive coverage of the "Arab Spring" revolts.

For a full list of winners, and more information about the Peabodys, visit the University's Peabody site HERE.