KUBYSHKIN A.I. “Culture Wars” in US and Canadian Universities: A Paradigm Shift
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.15688/jvolsu4.2026.2.13
Alexander I. Kubyshkin,
Doctor of Sciences (History), Professor, Department of Theory and Methods of Teaching Humanities, Saint Petersburg State University, Universitetskaya Nab., 7–9, 199034 Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation;
Research Fellow, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Saint Petersburg, Soyuza Pechatnikov St, 16, 190121 Saint Petersburg, Russian Federation,
This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. ,
https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0633-2842
Abstract. Introduction. This article analyzes the phenomenon of culture wars using events reflecting sociocultural conflict at universities in the United States and Canada over the course of half a century. It examines the evolution of the term “culture wars” in its theoretical and methodological implications. It outlines the main directions and trends in the contemporary historiography of “culture wars” and general issues concerning the evolution of higher education in the face of global challenges. The relationship between the student movement of the 1960s–1990s and the current crisis of neoliberal and postmodernist concepts of university evolution in the United States and Canada is demonstrated. Methods and materials. Systems-structural approach. Historicalcomparative method. Content analysis. Social constructivism. Materials from university archives in the USA and Canada. Historical research and scholarly articles by historians, political scientists, and cultural scholars from the USSR/Russia, USA, Canada, and Great Britain. Periodical press materials. Analysis. This paper utilizes a systems-structural approach to identify a range of theoretical and methodological issues related to the phenomenon of “culture wars” in its historical dynamics. This paper analyzes the causes of the sociocultural crisis in Western society in general and in universities in the USA and Canada in particular, amidst the growing confrontation between neoliberal and globalist values, which poses a serious threat to academic freedom and the development prospects of the modern university in the near future. Result. Using the example of the “Ryerson case,” the extent of the influence of the ideology of historical revisionism and relativism emanating from the United States on events in Canada is demonstrated. The article concludes that the further introduction of such “culture war” markers as deplatforming, political correctness, the rejection of traditional cultural values, and historical revisionism could lead to a distortion of the concept of the “university mission” as a vital intellectual resource and a platform for preserving democratic principles in society as a whole.
Funding. The study was funded by RSF, Grant № 22-18-00305-P “The images of enemy in Cold War popular culture: their content, contemporary reception and usage in Russian and U.S. symbolic politics”.
Key words: US and Canadian universities, sociocultural conflict, “culture war,” historiography, Cold War, historical revisionism and relativism, “cancel culture,” student movement.
Citation. Kubyshkin A.I. “Culture Wars” in US and Canadian Universities: A Paradigm Shift. Vestnik Volgogradskogo gosudarstvennogo universiteta. Seriya 4. Istoriya. Regionovedenie. Mezhdunarodnye otnosheniya [Science Journal of Volgograd State University. History. Area Studies. International Relations], 2026, vol. 31, no. 2, pp. 153-164. (in Russian). DOI: https://doi.org/10.15688/jvolsu4.2026.2.13
“Culture Wars” in US and Canadian Universities: A Paradigm Shift © 2026 by Kubyshkin A.I. is licensed under CC BY 4.0 
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