-=[ This American Life ]=-
Each week we choose a theme. Then anything can happen. This American Life is
true stories that unfold like little movies for radio. Personal stories with
funny moments, big feelings, and surprising plot twists. Newsy stories that try
to capture what it’s like to be alive right now. It’s the most popular weekly
podcast in the world, and winner of the first ever Pulitzer Prize for a radio
show or podcast. Hosted by Ira Glass and produced in collaboration with WBEZ
Chicago.
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(BIN) 801: Must Be Rats on the Brain [[Sun, 28 Dec 2025 18:00:00 -0500]]
The one animal we can’t seem to live without, even when we really,
really want to. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for
our premium subscriptionPrologue: At the announcement of New York
City’s inaugural rat czar, we meet Darneice Foster, who despises the
rats outside her apartment. And host Ira Glass introduces two special
co-hosts for today’s show. (11 minutes)Act One: Producer Elna Baker
meets Todd Sklar, a man who can’t quit rats. (22 minutes)Act Two:
Fifty years ago, New York City started to put garbage out in plastic
bags. This has become the number one food source for rats. Producer
Ike Sriskandarajah investigates the decision that led to the city’s
rat baby boom. (10 minutes)Act Three: How did Alberta, Canada pull off
a feat that has eluded the rest of human civilization? Ira visits the
largest rat-less land in the world. (15 minutes)Act Four: We drop a
hot mic into a hot mess of a rats’ nest. You’ll never believe what
happens next. (3 minutes)Transcripts are available at
thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about
sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) Christmas and Commerce [[Wed, 24 Dec 2025 00:00:00 -0500]]
Stories about the intersection of Christmas and retail, originally
broadcast in 1996 when our show was only a year old. Including David
Sedaris's "Santaland Diaries" about the seasons he spent working as an
elf at Macy's.
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(BIN) 877: The Making Of [[Sun, 21 Dec 2025 18:00:00 -0500]]
How one block in Portland, Oregon became a movie-set war zone that
lots of people think is a real war zone. Visit
thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium
subscription — or to give one as a gift!Prologue: What the movie
Hearts of Darkness and right-wing influencers have in common. (8
minutes)Act One: Producers Zoe Chace and Suzanne Gaber follow a bunch
of right-wing influencers as they search for Antifa in Portland. (31
minutes)Act Two: We meet the so-called leader of Antifa in Portland.
(16 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis
American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) 255: Our Holiday Gift-Giving Guide [[Sun, 14 Dec 2025 18:00:00 -0500]]
The vexing difficulty of finding the perfect gift. Visit
thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium
subscription.Prologue: Host Ira Glass goes to a busy Target store one
week before Christmas. Most shoppers he talks to don't think any of
their gifts will be returned. (3 minutes)Act One: Ian Brown tries,
after decades of failure, to give his mother the perfect Christmas
gift. He and his brother attempt something they haven't done since
they were kids: Rehearse and sing her a program of Christmas carols.
(19 minutes)Act Two: We play a 1959 original recording of Truman
Capote reading his holiday story A Christmas Memory. (18 minutes)Act
Three: Caitlin Shetterly reports on a true-life holiday fable from
rural Maine, complete with a misunderstood recluse with a heart of
gold, a deserving family in need, and a very special Christmas tree
farm with secrets of its own. (16 minutes)Transcripts are available at
thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about
sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) 876: Bigger Than Me [[Sun, 07 Dec 2025 18:00:00 -0500]]
When history comes knocking, you have to figure out what to do. Visit
thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium
subscription.Prologue: Brittany’s job is to answer anonymous calls and
texts from people in the military. This year, she’s gotten more than
usual–most of them are wondering about what to do with orders they’ve
been given. Or orders they’re afraid they’ll get someday in the
future. (9 minutes)Act One: Jad Abumrad tells the story of the
"ideological genealogy” of Fela Kuti’s anti-colonial politics–his
mother. In late 1940s Nigeria, Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti found herself at
the center of a big, historical moment: an uprising led by thousands
of women selling goods in Nigeria’s markets. Jad goes searching for
who she really was, and how she became the person who galvanized a
movement when history demanded it of her. (45 minutes)Transcripts are
available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy
policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) 875: I Hate Mysteries [[Sun, 23 Nov 2025 18:00:00 -0500]]
What’s in the box? What’s in the $%&ing box?!? Visit
thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium
subscription.Prologue: A class of second graders is handed a sealed
box with a mystery object inside. They are supposed to guess what it
is, but the lesson goes off the rails. (8 minutes)Act One: A man is
hired along with a crew to dig a mysterious hole on the slopes of Mt.
Shasta. The hole goes sixty feet down. But what are they looking for?
(24 minutes)Act 2: A sparkly mystery. One woman hopes the
military-industrial complex is involved. (4 minutes)Act Two: What
happens when the full force of the federal government arrives on your
block? (14 minutes)Act Three: A comedian finds himself trapped in an
uncomfortable mystery in the backseat of a cab. (4 minutes)Transcripts
are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy
policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) 874: Under One Roof [[Sun, 16 Nov 2025 18:00:00 -0500]]
What’s great about living in a family is that everyone sees everything
differently. Also, that’s what’s awful about living in a family. We go
behind closed doors with two families. Visit
thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium
subscription.Prologue: When Heather Gay started taking steps away from
Mormonism, she thought it was her secret. That her daughters had no
idea. Until she talked to them about their mismatched memories. (17
minutes)Act One: In every house, behind every closed door, a private
drama is unfolding. In the Rivera house, the drama comes in the form
of a question: should they stay or should they go? This question winds
its way around the house until someone finally answers it. (44
minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American
Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) 873: Got You Pegged [[Sun, 09 Nov 2025 18:00:00 -0500]]
Shalom Auslander goes on vacation with his family, suspects the
beloved, chatty old man in the room next door is an imposter, and sets
out to prove it. This and other stories about the pitfalls of making
snap judgments about others. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners
to sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Amy Roberts thought
it was obvious that she was an adult, not a kid, and she assumed the
friendly man working at the children's museum knew it too.
Unfortunately, the man had Amy pegged all wrong. And by the time she
figured it out, it was too late for either of them to save face. Host
Ira Glass talks to Amy about the embarrassing ordeal that taught her
never to assume she knows what someone else is thinking. (8
minutes)Act One: While riding in a patrol car to research a novel,
crime writer Richard Price witnessed a misunderstanding that, for many
people, is pretty much accepted as an upsetting fact of life. Richard
Price told this story, which he describes as a tale taken from real
life and dramatized, onstage at The Moth in New York. (12 minutes)Act
Two: There are situations where making judgments about people based on
limited information is not only accepted but required. One of those
situations is open adoption, where birth mothers actually choose the
adoptive parents for their child. Producer Nancy Updike talks to a
pregnant woman named Kim, going through the first stage of open
adoption: reading dozens of letters from prospective parents, all of
whom seem utterly capable and appealing. (6 minutes)Act Three: David
Rakoff picks a fight with a hit Broadway show. (6 minutes)Act Four:
Shalom Auslander tells the story of the time he went on vacation,
pegged the guest in the room next door as an imposter, and devoted his
holiday to trying to prove it. Shalom is the author of Feh: a Memoir.
(22 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis
American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) 872: Winners [[Sun, 02 Nov 2025 17:00:00 -0500]]
America loves winners—now more than ever. But how do you get to a win
in 2025 America? We watch someone trying to score a win in a game
whose rules are being made up as she plays. Visit
thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium
subscription.Prologue: Ira talks to producer Diane Wu about an
informal survey she’s done with the staff of This American Life about
a phrase Ira says a lot that includes the word “winners.” (8
minutes)Act One: Two people see one of President Trump’s first
executive orders and get excited, and then get to work. (46
minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American
Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) 871: The Thing About Things [[Sun, 26 Oct 2025 18:00:00 -0400]]
Three stories about the strange power inanimate objects can hold over
us. Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium
subscription.Prologue: Nunzio gets caught in a kind of servile
relationship—with a scooter. (8 minutes)Act One: Ted was six when he
first picked up a rock from the Petrified Forest National Park. Nearly
50 years later, he really wishes he hadn’t. Aviva DeKornfeld talked to
him. (15 minutes)Act Two: Heavyweight host Jonathan Goldstein leaps in
to help a family, who are not entirely sure they want or need his
help, get rid of their stuff. (31 minutes)Transcripts are available at
thisamericanlife.orgThis American Life privacy policy.Learn more about
sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) An Update from Ira [[Thu, 16 Oct 2025 00:00:00 -0400]]
Ira Glass shares some news about This American Life To sign up as a
Life Partner, visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners
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(BIN) 870: My Other Self [[Sun, 12 Oct 2025 18:00:00 -0400]]
What happens when people create alternate versions of themselves and
release them into the wild? Visit thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to
sign up for our premium subscription.Prologue: Host Ira Glass talks
about a recent experience being interviewed and the realization that
he was being asked about another version of himself. (4 minutes)Act
One: Reporter Evan Ratliff creates an AI version of himself and then
sets it loose on the world. This story was adapted from Evan's
podcast, Shell Game. (43 minutes)Act Two: Emmanuel Dzotsi explores the
phenomenon of people lying on first dates to project a better version
of themselves. Plus, he gets into a very personal example from his own
life. (8 minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis
American Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) 866: Watch Out for That Tree [[Fri, 05 Sep 2025 00:00:00 -0400]]
Small human plans that run into much larger obstacles. Visit
thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners to sign up for our premium
subscription.Prologue: Angela's dad, an accountant, made a spreadsheet
to prepare for their family trip to a national park. But there are
things you never think to put in a spreadsheet. (7 minutes)Act One: A
young couple, excited to start a new chapter in their lives, is
suddenly put on a very different trajectory. (30 minutes)Act Two: A
sixteen-year-old plans out a prank, and a complete stranger from
Honduras ends up in a million-dollar deal. What could go wrong? (25
minutes)Transcripts are available at thisamericanlife.orgThis American
Life privacy policy.Learn more about sponsor message choices.
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(BIN) Bonus: Nancy's Deep Cuts [[Thu, 17 Jul 2025 00:00:00 -0400]]
Ira Glass talks with longtime producer Nancy Updike about the most
personal stories they have put on the radio. This is a sample of the
bonus episodes we regularly release to our This American Life
Partners. To gain access to all the bonus episodes AND help us keep
making This American Life, join at thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners.
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(BIN) A Big Announcement [[Wed, 16 Oct 2024 00:00:00 -0400]]
Ira Glass has news to share about some things happening here at This
American Life. To sign up as a Life Partner, visit
thisamericanlife.org/lifepartners.
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