Documentaries

Labor Union Activism Is on the Rise, Recalling the Great Depression

Putin’s Nuclear Threats Evoke Cold War Tensions of the Cuban Missile Crisis

Amazon Rainforest Defenders Confront Violence, Encroachment and Politics

Nuclear Meltdowns Raised Fears, but Growing Energy Needs May Outweigh Them

Unprepared: Lessons From Two Massive Oil Spills

Can You Spot Misinformation?

Where's That Photo From? Identify the Source

Whites-Only Suburbs: How the New Deal Shut Out Black Homebuyers

Extremism in America (full series)

How a 1944 Supreme Court Ruling on Internment Camps Led to a Reckoning

Can Race Be a Factor in College Admissions? SCOTUS Reconsiders Affirmative Action.

A New Housing Program to Fight Poverty has an Unexpected History

Midterm Elections: 1966 Midterms Signal a Realignment, Shaping Today’s Parties

Holocaust Survivors Fleeing Ukraine Find New Home in Germany

Midterm Elections: How 1994 Midterms Set Off an Era of Divisive Politics

Facing Eviction: Teresa (Excerpt)

Facing Eviction: Landlords and Law Enforcement (Excerpt)

Facing Eviction: Introduction (Excerpt)

Facing Eviction

Facing Eviction Trailer

How Watergate and Citizens United Shaped Campaign Finance Law

Covid Deaths Left Orphans. The Stress of That Loss May Carry With It Lifelong Risks.
The Weight of Stigma: Heavier Patients Confront a Bias

Extremism in America: Out of the Shadows

Extremism in America: A Surge in Violence

Extremism in America: Missed Warnings

Extremism in America: The Oklahoma City Bombing

Extremism in America: Emergence of The Order

How the U.S. Has Treated Wartime Refugees

Why Supreme Court Confirmations Have Become So Bitter

Dictators and Civil Wars: The Cold War in Latin America

American Reckoning Trailer

American Reckoning

American Reckoning: The Bombing (Excerpt)

American Reckoning: Black Resistance (Excerpt)

American Reckoning: The Boycott (Excerpt)

American Reckoning: The Legacy (Excerpt)

Presidents v. Press: How the Pentagon Papers Leak Set Up First Amendment Showdowns

In El Salvador, a Journalist Faces New Limits. ‘We Want to Continue Shedding Light.’

How Prop. 187 Transformed the Immigration Debate and California Politics

What's in a Number? Some Research Shows That a Lower B.M.I. Isn't Always Better.

As Massacre Survivors Seek Justice, El Salvador Grapples With 1,000 Ghosts

Gerrymandering Tilts Political Power. Here’s How Redistricting Affects Democracy.
Both parties play the redistricting game, redrawing electoral boundaries to lock down power.
Are you a teacher? Check out our teaching resources for this video.

Black Swimmers Overcome Racism and Fear, Reclaiming a Tradition

9/11 Heroes: Surviving the Biggest Attack on U.S. Soil
First responders who survived 9/11 don’t want the day to be forgotten.
For teachers: This video is part of a collection of resources including four short films, each accompanied by a lesson plan and student activity.

How the Military Response to 9/11 Led to Two Decades of War in Afghanistan
Officials who drove the decades-long war in Afghanistan look back on the strategic mistakes and misjudgments that led to a 20-year quagmire.
For teachers: This video is part of a collection of resources including four short films, each accompanied by a lesson plan and student activity.

Special Education: The 50-Year Fight for the Right to Learn

Bringing Midwifery Back to Black Mothers

Why the Cold War Race for Nuclear Weapons Is Still a Threat

Covid-19 Changed the Way We Watch Movies. The 1918 Pandemic Set the Stage.

How the Korean War Changed the Way the U.S. Goes to Battle

The Cold War on TV: Joseph McCarthy vs. Edward R. Murrow

How the Cold War Arms Race Fueled a Sprint to the Moon

Shamed by Sex, Survivors of the Purity Movement Confront the Past

How a Cold War Airlift Saved Berlin With Food, Medicine and Chocolate
Racial Health Disparities Didn’t Start With Covid: The Overlooked History of Polio

Burden of Richmond Evictions Weighs Heaviest in Black Neighborhoods

We’re Catching More Diseases From Wild Animals, and It’s Our Fault.

How Decades of Housing Discrimination Hurts Fresno in the Pandemic

Trump and Biden Both Want to Repeal Section 230. Would That Wreck the Internet?

Health Risks of Vaping: Lessons From the Battle With Big Tobacco

New York Tenants Are Organizing Against Evictions, as They Did in the Great Depression

How to Fact-Check History

Poll Watchers and the Long History of Voter Intimidation

Enemies of the People: Trump and the Political Press (Media Mistakes Excerpt)

Enemies of the People: Trump and the Political Press (CNN's Missteps Excerpt)

Enemies of the People: Trump and the Political Press (False Equivalency Excerpt)

Bush v. Gore: How a Recount Dispute Affects Voting Today

Enemies of the People: Trump and the Political Press (Historical Excerpt)

Enemies of the People: Trump and the Political Press (Trailer)

Tenants Facing Eviction Over Covid-19 Look to a 1970s Solution

Political Debates: What the Unforgettable Moments Reveal

Working Sick During Covid: What We Learned from Swine Flu

The Domestic Violence Case That Turned Outrage Into Action

How Black Women Fought Racism and Sexism for the Right to Vote

What the Bungled Response to HIV Can Teach Us About Dealing With Covid-19

Racial Inequality Was Tearing the U.S. Apart, a 1968 Report Warned. It Was Ignored.

From Women’s Suffrage to the ERA, a Century-Long Push for Equality

Why History Urges Caution on Immunity Testing

American Samoa Dodged a Pandemic in 1918. Here’s What We Learned

Coronavirus Has a Playlist. Songs About Disease Go Way Back.

Coronavirus Reignites a Fight Over Rights of Detained Migrant Children

Coronavirus, Smoking, Vaping: Studies From the Past That Alarm Scientists

Coronavirus: Lessons From Past Epidemics

Meatless Burgers Are on Trend. Eating to Save the World Has a Long History.

Do Whistleblower Protections Work? Ask This One.
whistleblowers seeking to expose wrongdoing.

From Napster to Netflix: The History and Impact of Streaming Services

Combating the Myth of the Superpredator

Teaching Teens About Sex: The Decades-Old Debate over Abstinence-Only

AIDS: From Ryan White to Today's Silent Epidemic

Lessons From the Challenger Tragedy

Send In the Special Ops Forces

The Misunderstood McDonald's Hot Coffee Lawsuit

Trump’s Immigration Rhetoric Echoes a Bitter Fight from the 90s

Population Bomb: The Overpopulation Theory That Fell Flat

Hard Risks: Concussions in Sports, From the Boxing Ring to the Gridiron

The Surprising Legacy of the Boy in the Bubble

Could We Geoengineer Ourselves Out of Climate Change?

Lingering Peril From Lead Paint

Born by Surrogate: New Paths to Parenthood

Could a Simple Intervention Fight a Suicide Crisis?

Horses: Wild, But Not Free

The Birth of Free Agency

How Fear of the Measles Vaccine Took Hold

A Barge Full of Garbage Helped to Fuel a Recycling Movement

LSD Gets Another Look

She Rocked the Pentagon

The Modern Bystander Effect

DNA Clues Solve Crimes . . . With a Privacy Cost

Are Robots Really Taking Over?

Tabletop to Tablet: Using Dungeons & Dragons to Combat Screen Addiction

Thalidomide: Return of an Infamous Pill

Athletes vs. Injustice: Protests in Sports

Online All the Time? Researchers Predicted It.

Sexual Misconduct at Work, Again

This Snake Is Eating the Everglades

Israel Survived an Early Challenge With War Planes Smuggled by U.S. Vets

Can We Teach Cars to Drive? It's an Uphill Challenge.

The Moon’s Lasting Pull

Space Law: The Next Generation

Future of Aging

Perp Walks: When Police Roll Out the Blue Carpet

The Future of College

How a Folk Singer’s Murder Forced Chile to Confront Its Past

Future of Water

Future of Gaming

The Roots of Evangelicals’ Political Fervor

Genetic Screening: Controlling Heredity

Abortion Was Illegal. This Secret Group Defied the Law

For Private Prisons, Detaining Immigrants Is Big Business

Operation Ceasefire: Inside a Community's Radical Approach to Gang Violence

Future of Cities

A Trusted Pill Turned Deadly. How Tylenol Made a Comeback

Biosphere 2: A Faulty Mars Survival Test Gets a Second Act

From Y2K to 2038, Lessons Learned from First Computer Crisis

Trump Administration Sued for Torpedoing Enforcement of Landmark Housing Law

Blazes That Damaged Yellowstone Changed Wildfire Strategy

Where the Debate Over "Designer Babies" Began

She Derailed the Fight for Equal Rights for Women

Why We Can't Have a Civil Conversation About Guns

Old Attitudes on Addiction Are Changing. So Are Treatments.

Selling the Code: Can Genetic Testing Services Really Predict Your Future?

Fixing the Code: Genetically Engineering Your DNA to Cure Disease

The NFL Draft 20 Years After Manning-Leaf: How Teams Try to Pick a Winner

Finding the Code: The Race to Sequence the Human Genome and What It Means

Us vs. Them: from George Wallace to Donald Trump

What History Can Teach Us About Mass Killings

Myths and Misperceptions about Eating Disorders

Raising Doubts about Evolution… in Science Class

How ISIS Resembles the Doomsday Cults of the 1970s

Future of Work

Future of Money

Future of Home

Future of Fact

Future of Food

'Why Hasn't Sexual Harassment Disappeared?'

Reproductive Rights and the Women Who Sparked a Movement

Conspiracy Theories and Fake News from JFK to Pizzagate

Lobotomy: A Dangerous Fad's Lingering Effect on Mental Illness Treatment

Suing the President: The Students Who Challenged the Travel Ban

Sanctuary Cities: An Uproar That Began Long Ago

Forever Prison

Rachel Carson’s Warning on D.D.T. Ignited an Environmental Movement

Could You Patent the Sun?

Activating a Generation: From Live Aid to the Ice Bucket Challenge

Princess Diana Brought Attention to Land Mines, but Their Danger Lingers

The Populist Politician and California's Property Tax Revolt

How Zero Tolerance Blurred the Lines Between Schools and Criminal Justice

Upheaval at the 1860 Democratic Convention: What Happened When a Party Split

Lessons from the 2004 Democratic Convention: Obama's Speech

Lessons from the 1924 Democratic Convention: An Immigration Debate's Impact

Lessons from the 1912 Republican Convention: Birth of the Modern Primary

How It Started (1831): Conventional Wisdom

Lessons From the 1964 Republican Convention: Declaring War on the Establishment

Lessons from the 1968 Democratic Convention: Under the Shadow of Protests

Lessons from the 1976 Republican Convention: Why Ronald Reagan Lost the Nomination|

Smoking Man: Political Ads That Shaped the Battle for the White House

The Rock: Political Ads That Shaped the Battle for the White House

Willie Horton: Political Ads That Shaped the Battle for the White House

Morning in America: Political Ads That Shaped the Battle for the White House

It's 3:00 A.M.: Political Ads That Shaped the Battle for the White House

Daisy: Political Ads That Shaped the Battle for the White House

The Mommy Wars

The Outrage Machine

Atomic Vets

Welfare and the Politics of Poverty

A Change of Heart

Runaway Plane

What Is a Healthy Diet? The Answers Are Unsatisfying

How Heroin Addiction's Rural Spread Changed the War on Drugs

Free Speech VS Censorship: Warnings From Explicit Lyrics to Trigger Warnings

Argentina's Stolen Babies, and the Grandmothers Leading the Search

Lessons from Columbine About School Shootings and Media Misinformation

The Nanny Murder Case: Shaken Baby Syndrome on Trial

How a Standoff with the Black Panthers Fueled the Rise of SWAT

From Crack Babies to Oxytots: Lessons Not Learned

Why Waco is Still a Battleground in the 2nd Amendment Debate

Transgender Rights: A Decades-long Struggle for Equality

E. Coli Outbreaks Changed Food Production, But How Safe Are We?

Fire Safety and Chemicals in our Clothes

He's the only CIA Contractor to be Convicted in a Torture-related Case
The story of the first and only interrogator connected to the CIA to be convicted in a torture-related case.
For teachers: This video is part of a collection of resources including four short films, each accompanied by a lesson plan and student activity.

A Right to Die?

How Geography Drove MLK's Fight for a Ferry in Alabama

Power Line Fears

Is Multiple Personality Disorder Real? One Woman's Story

A Mother, a Dingo and an Australian Media Frenzy

The Murder of US Churchwomen in El Salvador That Exposed a Government Coverup

Reintroducing Wolves to Yellowstone was a Success. That's When Trouble Began.

How the Shootout at Ruby Ridge Resonates in the Gun Debate Today

Bees: Colony Collapse Disorder Is More Complicated Than You'd Think

How Prozac Turned Depression Medication into a Cultural Phenomenon

The Surprising Technological Revolution Launched by the Air Bag

Flawed Evidence: The Limits of Science in the Crime Lab

Agent Orange: Last Chapter of the Vietnam War

Her Vegetative State Caused Congress, President Bush and Even the Pope to Weigh In

Earthquake Readiness: How the San Franciso 1989 Quake Shook Awareness

The Shame of the Church

The Fly That Quarantined California and Pitted Environmentalists Against Farmers

The Preschool Sex Abuse Case that Changed How Molestation is Investigated

The Minneapolis Bridge Collapse that Sounded the Alarm on US Infrastructure

Stealing J. Edgar Hoover's Secrets

Crime and Punishment: Three Strikes and You’re Out

Toxic Waste in the Neighborhood: The Love Canal Disaster

Wrongly Accused of Terrorism: The Sleeper Cell That Wasn't
Six days after 9/11, the FBI’s raid on a sleeper cell signaled America’s resolve to fight terrorism. But, despite a celebrated conviction, there was one problem–they were wrong.
For teachers: This video is part of a collection of resources including four short films, each accompanied by a lesson plan and student activity.

Blackout: Understanding the US Power Grid's Vulnerability from the 2003 Failure

The Long War on Cancer

Hurricane Katrina's Aftermath and Lessons in Dealing with Disaster

How Cloning a Sheep Set Off a Sci Fi Panic

Richard Jewell: The Wrong Man

Walter Reed: The Battle for Recovery

Freeing Willy

The Battle For Busing

GMO Food Fears and the First Test Tube Tomato

The Tawana Brawley Story
