This American Life: The greatest podcast ever created

Hailing from WBEZ on Chicago Public Radio, "This American Life" has been the top podcast on iTunes at least since I have started listening about 2 years ago.  It has caught my attention, sucked me in, and now has changed my life.  I want to share this excitement with everyone I know! Even though I know that listening to audio podcasts does not and will not fancy everyone, I think more people should take the time to engage in a form of storytelling that has been greatly overlooked.

When I sat down to write out the best description of "This American Life," I figured their website would be a good place to get some ideas about what to tell people.  Their description of the show definitely says it better than anything I could ever come up with:


One of our problems from the start has been that when we try to describe This American Life in a sentence or two, it just sounds awful. For instance: each week we choose a theme and put together different kinds of stories on that theme. That doesn't sound like something we'd want to listen to on the radio, and it's our show.


So usually we just say what we're not. We're not a news show or a talk show or a call-in show. We're not really formatted like other radio shows at all. Instead, we do these stories that are like movies for radio. There are people in dramatic situations. Things happen to them. There are funny moments and emotional moments and—hopefully—moments where the people in the story say interesting, surprising things about it all. It has to be surprising. It has to be fun.

Besides just a radio podcast, they also had a TV show on Showtime for two seasons.  If you like documentary film, I highly recommend watching these two DVDs, which are available to buy and also to rent on Netflix.  One of the most interesting and relevant stories they shared on the TV show was an episode about an Iraqi in America on a very noble quest.



Subscribe to the podcast for free on iTunes, which will give you a new hour-long episode once a week.  Give it a try. It is very different than watching a movie or TV, and a lot like your mother (or host Ira Glass) reading you a bedtime story.  I love it.