John Bodner, a professor at Indiana University writes in his book Remaking America: Public Memory, Commemoration, and Patriotism in the Twentieth Century (1992) that any 'official' or 'textbook' interpretation of the past and present is now being challenged by racial, immigrant, ethnic, regional, and local interests, and by others seeking personal identification within the public memory. This raises the question whether any representation of war can memorialize all groups that contributed.
A very big question, indeed.
And so far American culture doesn't have such a good rap in this department. We've made movies about white superheroes and war heroes just as we've made movies about white troublemakers and underdogs in a higher percentage than the numbers would agree with.
Nonetheless, it makes perfect sense that immigrants, the marginalized in America, and those interested in peace will have different angles to understand America's military projects. An Afghani immigrant will tell a very different story than a native Texan, obviously.
This is a fairly general post, with no website to link to. I've just been considering the difficulty of constructing NATIONAL narratives of war as soon as we accept that war affects us all differently and there is never a consensus at home about the decisions politicians are making.
If action always receives more coverage than inaction and war always receives more coverage than peace movements, how should textbooks reflect the gaps when things aren't happening, when society is in gridlock?
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