Season 8 of this investigative docuseries follows award-winning journalist Lisa Ling as she travels across America exploring communities that are often unknown or misunderstood. As the country tries to reckon with the events of this tumultuous year, there are two questions on everyone's mind: "How did we get here?" and "how do we go forward?" To help make sense of it all, Ling takes a deep dive into our collective past to uncover hard truths and find some answers.

"History is so often told through the eyes of the victors," said Ling. "It can be dehumanizing to people whose stories are overlooked and leaves out surprising and inspiring events that add dimension to our country's past and give us road maps for the future. In this season of This Is Life, we explore consequential moments in American history that didn't make it into the books. Our hope is that we will become better informed about the contributions of all of our fellow Americans."