Origin Myths Fracture in Polarized America

As partisan polarization and cultural‑identity contestation intensify, canonical national narratives (e.g., the American Revolution as unifying founding) fragment into multiple, competing histories—military, enslaved peoples', and Indigenous narratives—so that mainstream historical consensus can no longer serve as a unifying civic script. Cultural producers who try to present a neutral synthesis risk producing incoherence rather than reconciliation because the background assumptions needed for consensus (shared facts, agreed priorities) are disputed. — If origin myths no longer cohere, civic education, memorialization, and political legitimacy debates will shift from reconciling facts to negotiating competing moral frames, altering how polity‑building is attempted.