In Latin America and the Caribbean, the teaching of history, geography, social sciences, and the humanities is not only geared toward training in various institutional settings, but also expresses profound political, cultural, and epistemological disputes that represent opposing societal projects vying to define the role of schools, collective memory, the meaning of citizenship, and teacher training. In this sense, social science education in the region operates as a key space of mediation where interpretations of the past, representations of the present, and the possibilities of shared futures are negotiated.

Over the past two decades, various studies have documented the rise of conservative discourses that seek to restrict or control the approach to controversial social issues, the teaching of the history of violence, gender studies, cultural diversity, human rights, and critical perspectives on social justice. In Brazil, the Escola sem Partido (School Without Political Parties) project has become a paradigmatic example of this tension. Researchers such as Frigotto (2017), Penna (2017), and Algebaile (2019) have demonstrated that this initiative is based on the idea that teachers engage in “ideological indoctrination” when addressing sensitive topics or questioning structural inequalities. Far from promoting neutrality, the Escola sem Partido project sought to limit teacher autonomy, render fundamental debates for democracy invisible, and reinstate a technocratic and depoliticized vision of education.

In Colombia, tensions are expressed primarily on two fronts: the teaching of the memory of the armed conflict and disputes surrounding gender and diversity approaches. During the 2016 peace referendum, conservative sectors instrumentalized the notion of "gender ideology" to attack school curricula on rights, sexualities, and diverse identities. Similarly, research such as that by Rodríguez Ávila (2019) and Aguilera (2020) has shown institutional and political resistance to the inclusion of the memory of the conflict in school curricula. These studies document instances of censorship, intimidation, or self-censorship by teachers, which ultimately weaken the role of schools as democratic spaces for understanding historical violence and building critical citizenship.

Argentina offers a complementary case, where the teaching of recent history and memory policies regarding the last military dictatorship (1976–1983) have been central since the early 2000s. However, in recent years, denialist and revisionist discourses have emerged that relativize state terrorism. Authors such as Carretero, Borón, and Lorenz (2017) and Southwell (2015) point out that many teachers face pressure to justify content that had historically been legitimized, and that these tensions produce climates of political conflict that reconfigure the meaning of teaching history.

Similar situations are observed in other countries in the region. In Mexico, debates on the national curriculum have been marked by tensions between community-based approaches and conservative discourses that seek to eliminate content related to gender, inequality, and Indigenous rights. In Chile, following the 2019 social uprising, debates intensified regarding the teaching of state violence and structural inequalities; however, recent reforms have attempted to reinstate criteria of “neutrality” that limit critical analysis. In Peru, discussions about incorporating a gender perspective into the curriculum generated conservative mobilizations demanding its elimination, weakening progress made by social movements and educational collectives. In Central America, countries such as Guatemala, El Salvador, and Honduras face additional difficulties in integrating the teaching of armed conflict or the memories of the civil war due to political pressures, the absence of memory policies, and contexts of structural violence. In the Caribbean, especially in the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, disputes persist between nationalist narratives and critical approaches that seek to question the colonial, racial, and economic roots of contemporary inequality.

Beyond the content itself, all these tensions directly impact teacher training, a strategic field where the very meaning of education is defined. In recent decades, neoliberal policies have taken hold in the region, promoting standardization and quantitative assessment as cornerstones of educational quality. These policies, promoted by multilateral organizations and adopted by various ministries, pressure initial teacher training programs to reorganize their curricula according to international standards and tests like PISA or SABER Pro. As a result, essential aspects for the development of critical teachers—such as historical analysis, critical pedagogy, social memory, and territorial issues—are losing ground to instrumental and measurable competencies.

In continuing education and teacher careers, incentives, promotions, and evaluations are often more closely tied to performance indicators than to innovative teaching practices, community work, or educational research. This leads to a covert deprofessionalization of the teaching profession, reducing its value to quantifiable results and ignoring the ethical, social, and relational complexities of education. At the level of daily practice, these dynamics reinforce institutional climates of surveillance, control, and self-censorship that restrict the possibility of critically addressing issues such as violence, inequality, racism, the environmental crisis, or territorial conflicts.

Researchers such as Apple (2006), Tenti Fanfani (2010), Frigotto (2017), Cerri (2019), and Torres Santomé (2020) agree that the debate surrounding the teaching of social sciences is not merely pedagogical; it is, above all, political and cultural. It defines which memories are preserved, which voices are heard, which conflicts are made visible, and what kind of individuals are being cultivated. The question of critical teaching of history and the social sciences thus implies a defense of teacher autonomy and of the school as a critical space for preserving democracy.

The Latin American and Caribbean landscape presents a complex scenario where conservative discourses, standardization policies, and the precariousness of teaching positions combine to limit critical pedagogies and democratic education. At the same time, there is a broad tradition of pedagogical resistance that defends the importance of the social sciences for understanding conflicts, strengthening memory, and building more just societies. Faced with these challenges, it is urgent to consolidate networks, comparative research, and teacher training projects that contribute to the defense of critical thinking, historical memory, and social justice as pillars of education in the region.

The teaching of Social Sciences and History in Latin America constitutes a strategic field of political, cultural, and epistemological dispute. In a scenario marked by the expansion of neoliberal policies, the advance of conservative discourses, accelerated digitalization, and the persistence of social conflicts, the way in which teachers are trained and school knowledge is constructed acquires special relevance for the defense of democracy, memory, and social justice. This section develops the theoretical foundation that supports the Working Group (WG) "Teaching Social Sciences and History: Teacher Training and Practice," situating its relevance within the Latin American context and outlining the conceptual and methodological frameworks that guide the proposal.

The Didactics of Social Sciences as a critical and situated field

In Latin America, the Didactics of Social Sciences and History have become established as a field of research that integrates knowledge from history, geography, sociology, anthropology, political science, psychology, and critical pedagogies. Far from being limited to an instrumental or technocratic approach, this field studies the relationships between disciplinary knowledge, school knowledge, collective memory, and teaching practices (Aisenberg & Alderoqui, 1993; Benejam, 2002; Pagès & Santisteban, 2011).

Teaching is understood as a social, political, and cultural process in which meanings are constructed about the past, territory, citizenship, and collective life. This approach recognizes that teachers are not merely transmitters of information, but rather producers of pedagogical knowledge, cultural mediators, and subjects who critically interpret social realities. From this perspective, the field has incorporated issues such as:

- recent history and traumatic memories (Jelin 2012; Lorenz and Carretero, 2015; Southwell, 2015);

- teaching experiences and knowledge (Goodson, 2004; Contreras & Pérez de Lara);

- tangible, intangible and community heritage;

- political education and critical citizenship (Freire, 1970; Giroux, 2011);

- curricular justice and decolonial approaches (Walsh, 2013).

Teaching as a field of political and cultural dispute in Latin America

The region has been the scene of tensions that demonstrate attempts to control or restrict the teaching of sensitive or critical topics. Some prominent examples include: the Escola sem Partido (School Without Parties) movement in Brazil, which sought to censor debates on gender, historical memory, and inequality; the controversies in Colombia surrounding the teaching of the armed conflict and gender perspectives; the resurgence of denialist discourses in Argentina regarding the dictatorship; curricular tensions in Chile related to the 1973 coup; and debates in Mexico within the framework of the New Mexican School. In all these cases, the teaching of Social Sciences becomes an arena of dispute where social projects, historical narratives, and political horizons clash. As Apple (2006) and Giroux (2011) have pointed out, these processes aim to limit teacher autonomy and neutralize critical thinking in schools.

In response, Latin American educational research has defended the importance of memory, diversity, territorial analysis, subaltern voices, interculturality, and the recognition of contemporary conflicts as pillars of a public education committed to democracy.

Teacher training: trajectories, identities and educational policies

Initial and ongoing teacher training is fundamental to understanding the transformations in the field of education. In the region, pressures stemming from standardization policies—guided by international organizations—coexist with critical approaches that promote pedagogical autonomy and situated research. Several authors (Terigi, 2020; Goodson, 2004; Gentili, 2011; Contreras & Pérez de Lara) have shown that teacher identity is shaped by professional biography, community ties, territorial experiences, and pedagogical practices, and not solely by curricular guidelines. This perspective allows for the analysis of tensions such as:

- The impact of job insecurity and administrative overload;

- The invisibility of local and community knowledge;

- The reduction of teaching to standardized competencies;

- The predominance of measuring science in formats that promote individualism and are detrimental to the collaborative and reflective approach it demands.

In response to these challenges, the GT proposes to develop, during its first year, a comparative regional state of the art on teacher training in Social Sciences and History, in order to identify models, traditions, ruptures and epistemological emergences, and to build a common corpus to support collaborative research.

Recent history, memory and heritage as formative cores

Historical memory and recent history constitute a central axis of education in societies marked by dictatorships, armed conflicts, political violence, and serious human rights violations. Schools, archives, museums, local communities, and community-based pedagogies have become central arenas for ethical and political debate. Authors such as Jelin (2002), Allier Montaño (2013), Carretero and Bermúdez (2012), and Lorenz and Southwell (2015) have shown that teaching the recent past/present involves:

- To challenge hegemonic narratives and historiographical disputes.

- Recognize plural, divergent and subaltern memories.

- To strengthen historical awareness and social empathy.

- Promote restorative, critical and emancipatory practices.

- To discuss the scope of memory policies.

Likewise, tangible and intangible heritage operates as a key category for analyzing the relationships between territory, identity, memory and violence, and for developing educational projects that link school, community and social experience.

Digital culture, youth and new forms of historical consciousness

In recent decades, digitization has radically transformed how young people access, circulate, and construct historical and social knowledge. Historical consciousness is now shaped within an informational ecology distributed across social networks, short videos, video games, collaborative platforms, digital repositories, and algorithms. Studies by Cerri (2019), Henríquez & Araya (2019), and Buckingham (2008) indicate that this digital ecosystem produces new forms of:

- Youth political participation.

- Appropriation of the past.

- Circulation of extremist or denialist discourses.

- Dissemination of misinformation and fake news.

- Narrative creation and public memory.

These phenomena demand the development of critical digital teaching methods that integrate media analysis, critical literacy, ethics of care, and situated historical thinking.

Theoretical and methodological projection of the Working Group

The relevance of the Working Group lies in its capacity to articulate situated knowledge, comparative research, and collective production aimed at positioning and defending the place of the Social Sciences and History in teacher training, in schools, and in Latin American democratic life. Its methodological approach integrates:

- Development of a Latin American state of the art.

- Construction of open databases and repositories.

- Biographical interviews and pedagogical maps.

- Comparative analysis of training programs.

- Systematization of school and community experiences.

- Production of podcasts, seminars, collective publications and educational materials.

In this way, the GT is projected as a continental space for thought, research and advocacy, committed to social justice, memory,