Abstract
In the 1990s, the United States faced several history wars about the meaning of the national past for that present. Among these, we can highlight the controversy over National History Standards, which sought to minimally incorporate certain multicultural perspectives for the teaching of history in the country, and the Crossroads exhibition, imagined as a critical reflection about the end of World War II and the use of atombombs against Japan. These disputes, the article argues, can be understood in the broader context of the culture wars that raged in the period as well as the return to the past driven by the gradual erosion of futuristic projects during those years. Finally, we briefly discuss the impact of the history wars in the American disciplined historiography.
Keywords:
history wars; National History Standards; Crossroads.