Radio Diaries works with people to document their own lives for public radio: teenagers, seniors, prison inmates and others whose voices are rarely heard. We help people share their stories—and their lives—in their own words, creating documentaries that are powerful, surprising, intimate and timeless.

Diarists become reporters of their own lives. They conduct interviews, keep an audio journal, and record the sounds of daily life—usually collecting over 30 hours of raw tape. We collaborate with each reporter, editing the material into radio documentaries for National Public Radio's All Things Considered.

Radio Diaries is a not-for-profit organization. We are funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, The National Endowment for the Arts, The New York State Council on the Arts and others and listener donations. Our series have almost every major broadcasting award, including The duPont-Columbia University Award, The RFK Journalism Award, The Third Coast Award, and The Casey Journalism Award.

We also publish an oral history guide for young people, the Teen Reporter Handbook, which is used in schools and community radio stations across the country. Contact us for more information.

"A tape recorder with microphone in hand…can be used to capture the voice of a celebrity, whose answers are ever ready and flow through all the expected straits. I have yet to be astonished by one. It can be used to capture the thoughts of the non-celebrated—on the steps of a public housing project, in a frame bungalow, in a furnished apartment, in a parked car—and these 'statistics' become persons, each one unique. I am constantly astonished."

—Studs Terkel