Decoder Ring

By Slate Podcasts

Society & Culture History

What's Decoder Ring about?

Decoder Ring is the show about cracking cultural mysteries. In each episode, host Willa Paskin takes a cultural question, object, or habit; examines its history; and tries to figure out what it means and why it matters.

4.6

1,165 ratings

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The Forgotten Video Game Ab...

11.15.2023

In 1992, a Minnesota-based software company known for its educational hit The Oregon Trail released another simulation-style game to school districts across the country. Freedom! took kids on a journey along the Underground Railroad, becoming the first American software program ...

Decoder Ring episodes:

11.15.2023 The Forgotten Video Game About Slavery In 1992, a Minnesota-based software company known for its educational hit The Oregon Trail released another simulation-style game to school districts across the country. Freedom! took kids on a journey along the Underground Railroad, becoming the first American software program ...
11.08.2023 The Dating Manual Unlike Any Other From the moment it was released in 1995, The Rules was controversial. Some people loved it—and swore that the dating manual’s throwback advice helped them land a husband. Others thought it was retrograde hogwash that flew in the face of ...
11.01.2023 Mailbag: The Recorder, Limos, and “Baby on Board” Signs We receive a lot of fantastic show ideas from our listeners—and we’re grateful for each and every one. For our latest mailbag episode, we’re tackling five of your questions, including “Why the hell do we teach kids to play the ...
10.25.2023 When Art Pranksters Invaded Melrose Place In the mid-1990s, the prime time drama Melrose Place became a home to hundreds of pieces of contemporary art—and no one noticed. In this episode, Isaac Butler tells the story of the artist collective that smuggled subversive quilts, sperm-shaped pool ...
10.18.2023 The Fast Decline of the Slow Dance Judging from teen dramas on Netflix, the slow dance seems to be alive and well. But when you talk to actual teens, it’s clear this time-honored tradition is on life support. In this episode, we trace the history of slow ...
10.11.2023 Fall 2023 Teaser We’re back with a new batch of cultural mysteries! This season, Decoder Ring explores the decline of an awkward yet unforgettable rite of passage: slow dancing. And, how did millions of TV viewers miss the experimental art installation that was ...
08.09.2023 Think Catchphrases Are Dead? Eat My Shorts. Once you start listening for catchphrases in everyday life—you can’t stop hearing them. From the radio era’s “Holy mackerel!” to Fonzie’s “Ayyy!” to Urkel’s multiple go-to lines on Family Matters, we explore the irresistible quotables from sitcoms, movies and social ...
08.02.2023 The Quest for a Homemade Hovercraft When Slate’s Evan Chung was a kid, he was obsessed with a mysterious advertisement that ran for decades in the scouting magazine Boys’ Life. Under the enticing headline “You Can Float on Air,” the ad assured Evan—and generations of scouts—that ...
07.26.2023 A Brief History of Making Out Kissing—the romantic, sexual, steamy kind—is so ingrained in us that it just seems like a fact of life. Like breathing or eating, we just do it. But what if it’s not like that at all? In this episode, we’re going ...
07.19.2023 What's Really Going On Inside a Mosh Pit? The mosh pit has a reputation as a violent place where (mostly) white guys vent their aggression. There’s some truth to that, but it’s also a place bound by camaraderie and—believe it or not—etiquette. In this episode, we explore the ...
07.12.2023 The Great Parmesan Cheese Debate Parmesan is a food—but it’s not just a food. Italy’s beloved cheese is often paired with a deep craving for tradition and identity. But its history also involves intrepid immigrants, lucrative businesses and an American version that’s probably available in ...
07.05.2023 Summer 2023 Teaser Join Decoder Ring as we unlock a whole new season of cultural mysteries. First, we’ll sniff around Italy’s best-loved cheese to test an incredible claim: Is the most authentic parmesan being made not in Parma—but in Wisconsin? Next, a group ...
05.10.2023 Who Owns the Tooth Fairy? We pride ourselves on being grounded, rational beings, but flitting amongst us is a mystery: the Tooth Fairy. This flying piece of folklore is alive and well in the 21st century, handed down to kids in whatever way their parents ...
05.03.2023 Why You Can’t Find a Damn Parking Spot Parking is one of the great paradoxes of American life. On the one hand, we have paved an ungodly amount of land to park our cars. On the other, it seems like it’s never enough. Slate’s Henry Grabar has spent ...
04.26.2023 The Artist Who Was Both Loved and Disdained We bring you a special episode from Sidedoor, a podcast about the treasures that fill the vaults of the Smithsonian. This story is inspired by “Big Band,” a defining work by the painter LeRoy Neiman. Neiman was a character, a ...
04.19.2023 The Curious Case of Columbo's Message to Romania Part 2 Last week, we put on the proverbial raincoat and made like Columbo to investigate Peter Falk’s claim that he recorded a special Cold War message telling Romanians to “put down their guns.” This week, we’re back on the case, and ...
04.12.2023 The Curious Case of Columbo's Message to Romania Part 1 Not too long ago an old clip surfaced of Peter Falk on David Letterman, in which he told an intriguing tale about recording a special Cold War message for Romanian state television. The clip went viral and got our attention ...
04.05.2023 Spring 2023 Teaser Decoder Ring is back with a new season of cultural mysteries to crack. We'll kick things off with a proper Cold War caper....did Peter Falk, star of the old TV show Columbo, really team up with the U.S. Government to ...
01.09.2023 Slate Plus Exclusive: The Making of This Season Host Willa Paskin and producer Katie Shepherd discuss how this season of Decoder Ring came together. Slate Plus members have access to this whole interview. Sign up for Slate Plus to access this exclusive episode and support the show. Learn ...
12.27.2022 The Mailbag Episode We’re really lucky to get a lot of listener emails, suggesting topics for the show. In this episode, we’re going to dig into a handful of the most fascinating ones that we’ve yet to tackle on the show. We’re taking ...
12.20.2022 Encore: ‘You’ve Got Mail’ Got It Wrong (This episode originally aired in March 2020.) The 1998 romantic comedy You’ve Got Mail, starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, is about the brutal fight between a beloved indie bookstore, the Shop Around the Corner, and Fox Books, an obvious ...
12.13.2022 Cellino & Barnes, Injury Attorneys, 800-888-8888 Ross Cellino and Steve Barnes were two Buffalo-based lawyers who became the literal poster-men for personal injury advertising. They poured millions of dollars into ads that did more than just bring in clients: it turned the duo into household names ...
12.06.2022 How Preppy Became Streetwear We bring you a special episode from the Articles of Interest podcast hosted by Avery Trufelman about the incredible reach and adaptability of preppy clothes. It’s a story about the great modernizer of Ivy style, Ralph Lauren, and how he ...
11.29.2022 The New Age Hit Machine For this episode, a story from Slate senior producer Evan Chung about how Yanni, John Tesh and a number of other surprising acts made it big in the 1990s. It’s a throwback to a simpler time—when musicians struggled to find ...
11.22.2022 The Butt and the Bustle For about two decades towards the end of the Victorian era, in the 1870s and 1880s, a large bustle-enhanced bottom was the height of fashion. In this episode we explore how it’s connected to today’s big booty craze. We look ...
11.15.2022 The Truth About #TheDress In the history of viral images, #TheDress has got to be in the top 10. This unassuming photo of a party dress kicked off a global debate when people realized they were seeing it completely differently. Is it black and ...
11.10.2022 Fall 2022 Teaser Decoder Ring is back with a new season of juicy topics, like.... Remember the viral phenomenon and optical mind-blower known as “The Dress”? What does another peculiar piece of clothing from the past—the bustle—tell us about fashion trends today? And, ...
10.12.2022 McGruff Takes a Bite Out of Crime Pt. 2 McGruff the Crime Dog arrived on the scene at the dawn of the 1980s, just as a firehose of anti-drug PSAs was inundating the youth of America. These messages didn’t always work as intended—but they did work their way into ...
10.04.2022 McGruff Takes a Bite Out of Crime Pt. 1 McGruff the Crime Dog arrived on the scene at the dawn of the 1980s, just as a firehose of anti-drug PSAs was inundating the youth of America. These messages didn’t always work as intended—but they did work their way into ...
08.23.2022 Slate Plus Exclusive: The Making of This Season Host Willa Paskin talks about topics versus narratives, translating fabulists, and creating a sound landscape for the world of Mae West. Slate Plus members have access to this whole interview. Sign up for Slate Plus to access this exclusive episode ...
08.16.2022 The “Sex” Scandal That Made Mae West In the early 1930s, Mae West’s dirty talk and hip swiveling walk made her one of the biggest movie stars in America. But before West hit the big-screen, she was prosecuted for staging not one, but two scandalous plays. In ...
08.09.2022 The First Alien Abductees When you think of an alien abduction, what do you picture? Humanoid creatures, medical experiments, lost memories retrieved through hypnosis? That narrative was largely unknown until Betty and Barney Hill went public about their own alien abduction in the 1960s. ...
08.02.2022 The Most Famous Poet No One Remembers Rod McKuen sold multiple millions of poetry books in the 60s and 70s. He released dozens of albums, was a regular on late night, and was even nominated for an Oscar. So, how did the most salable poet in American ...
07.26.2022 The Mall is Dead (Long Live the Mall) What do we lose if we lose the mall? 70 years into their existence, these hulking temples to commerce are surprisingly resilient and filled with contradictions. In this episode, Alexandra Lange, the author of the new book Meet Me at ...
07.19.2022 Summer 2022 Teaser Decoder Ring is coming back with a new season featuring a whole new set of questions.... Like, is the shopping mall really dying? How did a poet who sold millions of books and records 50 years ago, come to be ...
05.17.2022 The Storytelling Craze When did everyone become a storyteller? Decades after George Lucas and Steve Jobs made storytelling a big business, every company now wants to tell “Our Story.” Instagram and TikTok let everyone else tell their “stories,” and the number of people ...
05.10.2022 “We Got Ourselves a Convoy” In the 1970s, a song about protesting truckers topped the music charts in multiple countries, and kicked off a pop culture craze for CB radios. In early 2022, that same song became an anthem for a new trucker-led protest movement ...
05.03.2022 The Sideways Effect In 2004, the indie flick Sideways was released in just four theaters, but it had a big impact, earning five Oscar nominations and $110 million worldwide. “I thought it was just going to be a nice little comedy,” filmmaker Alexander ...
04.26.2022 The Madness Behind ‘The Method’ When we think of method acting, we tend to think of actors going a little over the top for a role – like Jared Leto, who allegedly sent his colleagues dead rats when he was preparing to be The Joker, ...
04.19.2022 “F--k Everything, We're Doing Five Blades” In the early 2000s, an arms race broke out in the world of men’s shaving. After decades with razors that had only one blade and then decades with razors that had only two, the number of blades rapidly spiraled up ...
04.12.2022 Spring 2022 Teaser Decoder Ring is coming back with a new season featuring a whole new set of questions…and some good surprising answers. Like, how did razors come to have such a ridiculous amount of blades on them? Did one line from Paul ...
02.10.2022 Decoder Ring Presents Endless Thread: The Rickroll Hi Decoder Ring listeners! Right now we’re in-between seasons and starting to work on some new stories, but in the meantime we wanted to share something from another podcast we think you’d love: Endless Thread from WBUR, where hosts Ben ...
12.23.2021 Custer's Revenge Custer's Revenge is widely considered one of the worst video games ever made. Originally released as part of a series of Swedish Erotica-branded adult games for the Atari 2600, Custer's Revenge involves moving a pixelated General Custer across the screen ...
12.14.2021 The Fame That Got Away Today on Decoder Ring: Three stories about fame, and one about monkeys. Are primates susceptible to celebrity endorsements? What does fame do to the mind of a famous person? Who were the famous tattooed ladies of the 1880s? And what's ...
12.07.2021 Truly Tasteless Jokes Note: This episode is about offensive material, and so contains explicit and offensive language. Truly Tasteless Jokes were a series of joke books that dominated the bestsellers list during the 1980s. An equal opportunity joke book: Truly Tasteless Jokes were ...
11.30.2021 The Philosophy of Vampires In literature, the choice to become a vampire is a metaphor for transformative experiences. On this episode, we bring you a story from Slate's Hi-Phi Nation podcast, which explores problems in contemporary philosophy through story. From real-life blood suckers, to ...
11.23.2021 You Just Lost The Game When you think about the game, you lose the game. When you lose the game you must declare that you have lost the game, causing all others in your vicinity to also lose the game. That’s it, that’s the game. ...
11.16.2021 The Alberta Rat War Rats live wherever people live, with one exception: the Canadian province of Alberta. A rat sighting in Alberta is a major local event that mobilizes the local government to identify and eliminate any hint of infestation. Rat sightings makes the ...
11.09.2021 The Great Helga Hype In the summer of 1986, both Time Magazine and Newsweek ran blockbuster cover stories on the same subject: a secret cache of provocative, intimate paintings by Andrew Wyeth, one of America's most famous artists. These paintings were completed over fifteen ...
08.06.2021 Selling Out In 2001, Oprah Winfrey invited Jonathan Franzen to come on her show to discuss his new novel The Corrections. A month later she withdrew the invitation, kicking off a media firestorm. The Oprah-Franzen Book Club Dust-Up of 2001 was a ...

Older episodes

Decoder Ring

What's Decoder Ring about?

Download our free app to listen on your phone

Decoder Ring episodes:

The Forgotten Video Game About Slavery

The Dating Manual Unlike Any Other

Mailbag: The Recorder, Limos, and “Baby on Board” Signs

When Art Pranksters Invaded Melrose Place

The Fast Decline of the Slow Dance

Fall 2023 Teaser

Think Catchphrases Are Dead? Eat My Shorts.

The Quest for a Homemade Hovercraft

A Brief History of Making Out

What's Really Going On Inside a Mosh Pit?

The Great Parmesan Cheese Debate

Summer 2023 Teaser

Who Owns the Tooth Fairy?

Why You Can’t Find a Damn Parking Spot

The Artist Who Was Both Loved and Disdained

The Curious Case of Columbo's Message to Romania Part 2

The Curious Case of Columbo's Message to Romania Part 1

Spring 2023 Teaser

Slate Plus Exclusive: The Making of This Season

The Mailbag Episode

Encore: ‘You’ve Got Mail’ Got It Wrong

Cellino & Barnes, Injury Attorneys, 800-888-8888

How Preppy Became Streetwear

The New Age Hit Machine

The Butt and the Bustle

The Truth About #TheDress

Fall 2022 Teaser

McGruff Takes a Bite Out of Crime Pt. 2

McGruff Takes a Bite Out of Crime Pt. 1

Slate Plus Exclusive: The Making of This Season

The “Sex” Scandal That Made Mae West

The First Alien Abductees

The Most Famous Poet No One Remembers

The Mall is Dead (Long Live the Mall)

Summer 2022 Teaser

The Storytelling Craze

“We Got Ourselves a Convoy”

The Sideways Effect

The Madness Behind ‘The Method’

“F--k Everything, We're Doing Five Blades”

Spring 2022 Teaser

Decoder Ring Presents Endless Thread: The Rickroll

Custer's Revenge

The Fame That Got Away

Truly Tasteless Jokes

The Philosophy of Vampires

You Just Lost The Game

The Alberta Rat War

The Great Helga Hype

Selling Out

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