History of the Self: Love
How did love – this thing that's supposed to be beautiful, magical, transformative – turn into a neverending slog? We went searching for answers, and we found them in surprising places. On today's sho...
26 Dec 202453min
Embedded: The Black Gate
In the Xinjiang region of western China, the government has rounded up and detained hundreds of thousands of Uyghurs and other Muslim ethnic groups. Many haven't been heard from in years, and more sti...
24 Dec 202427min
History of the Self: Smell and Memory
"History" can seem big and imposing. But it's always intensely personal – it's all of our individual experiences that add up to historical events. Over the next few episodes, we're exploring the perso...
19 Dec 202451min
Going to the Source of L.A.'s Water
Throughline associate producer Anya Steinberg talks to supervising senior editor Julie Caine about her reporting trip to Owens Valley in northeastern California for the episode, "Water in the West," a...
16 Dec 202426min
When Christmas Went Viral
Christmas wasn't always a national shopping spree — or even a day off work. But in 19th-century London, it went viral. When Charles Dickens published A Christmas Carol, the book's tale of miserly Scro...
12 Dec 202449min
Seeking Asylum in the U.S.
The U.S. has long professed to be a country where people can seek refuge. That's the promise etched into the base of the Statue of Liberty. But it's never been that clear-cut.Today on the show, the st...
5 Dec 202452min
The Lord Of Misrule (Throwback)
By the time his book went to press in London, on November 18, 1633, Thomas Morton had been exiled from the Puritan colonies in Massachusetts. His crimes: drinking, carousing, and — crucially — buildin...
28 Nov 202449min
The Mother of Thanksgiving
The Thanksgiving story most of us hear is about friendship and unity. And that's what Sarah Josepha Hale had on her mind when she sat down to write a letter to President Lincoln in 1863, deep into the...
21 Nov 202450min
