This American Life

There's always someone whose job it is to decide if you measure up.

In these dark, combative times, we attempt the most radical counterprogramming we could imagine: a show made up entirely of stories about delight.

This holiday season, we bring you a show filled with stories of people going to great lengths to throw a special Christmas for their families.

What the day-to-day business of saving the world looks like. We visit with one group of people who are trying to rescue us from something very large, and another group trying to rescue us from something very small.

To commemorate our show’s 25th year, we have a program about people who were born the year our show went on the air.

For Thanksgiving weekend, stories about food, and people who set out on very particular missions with food.

Stories of people changing their minds.

People grappling with an endless presidential election.

Ahead of the election, we have stories about people trying to live in the unreality that defines this moment. Election officials combat a contagion among their very own workers; people who've never owned guns suddenly go buy them; and two women who allege they were sexually assaulted by the president compare notes.

Stories of people who find themselves stuck in small spaces—an elevator, an attic, an orchestra pit—trying to make sense of their new surroundings.