890: Maximal Americanness
This American Life
07/06/26
•56m
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On this country's 250th birthday, we bring you stories about the most American people, places, objects, and social norms that make this country what it is.
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(00:00:00) Prologue: Ira talks to Pablo Torre about Major League Baseball’s new challenge system, and how it’s been optimized for maximum drama. (10 minutes)
(00:11:10) Act One: Writer Jiayang Fan wrestles with a very common question she has never quite understood. (5 minutes)
(00:17:15) Act Two: People come from all over the country to walk down one of Michigan’s tallest sand dunes, and then promptly turn around and trudge back up. Aviva DeKornfeld talks to Americans spending their limited vacation time on this punishing activity. (8 minutes)
(00:26:13) Act Three: Emanuele Berry talks to Ira about Season 13 of the reality TV show, Survivor, known to fans as the “race war” season. (8 minutes)
(00:34:08) Act Four: Years before his famous dictionary, Noah Webster wrote a book that took on a life of its own and served an unexpected purpose. (8 minutes)
(00:42:27) Act Five: Emmanuel Dzotsi investigates a musical phenomenon very particular to the United States: singers embellishing the end of the national anthem. (9 minutes)
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Previous Episode
128: Four Corners
June 28
•60m
We try to tell the story of life in America through portraits of life on four different corners, in four different states across the nation.
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- Prologue: Host Ira Glass talks about the Four Corners tourist monument where Arizona, Colorado, Utah and New Mexico meet. (2 minutes)
- Act One: Sarah Vowell has a theory that you can tell the entire history of the United States by standing on one street corner—specifically at Michigan Avenue and Wacker Drive in Chicago—and describing all the events that happened within eyeshot of the corner. She covers three centuries of history, from Louis Joliet to Keanu Reeves. (21 minutes)
- Act Two: Scott Richer and Julie Riggs of Louisville, Kentucky, were supposed to have their first kiss at the corner where South Fourth Street meets the alley behind the West End Baptist Church. But it went wrong. (7 minutes)
- Act Three: Writer Mike Paterniti tells a story of dogs and a community of dogwalkers that formed on the grounds of an old cemetery at the corner of Vaughn and Clifford in Portland, Maine. (14 minutes)
- Act Four: Writer Achy Obejas reads a piece of short fiction from her book, We Came All the Way from Cuba So You Could Dress Like This? (11 minutes)
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Next Episode
891: The Test Case
July 13
•71m
Some people in this country think Antifa is a dangerous domestic terror organization. Some think that’s a complete myth. This week, we go to the federal trial where, for the first time, the government sets out to prove that Antifa is real. Zoe Chace reports.
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(00:00:00) Prologue: Host Ira Glass tells the story of what happened at the Prairieland Detention Center in Alvarado, Texas. The government claims this was an attack by an Antifa cell. The defense says it was a protest gone awry. This argument goes to court in a first-of-its-kind trial. (7 minutes)
(00:07:00) Act One: Reporter Zoe Chace walks us through one of the worst days for the defense: all these guns. (5 minutes)
(00:13:51) Act Two: Zoe takes us through the testimony of the government’s Antifa expert. The defense team is optimistic that things are going well for them. (8 minutes)
(00:29:55) Act Three: Zoe goes to jail to talk with one of the cooperating witnesses for the prosecution, a former church lady named Lynette Sharp. She has a lot to say about the events in her life that led her to accept a plea deal and testify against her friends. (24 minutes)
(00:55:17) Act Four: The verdicts come in. (12 minutes)
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