He is considered as being among the earlier and most influential applicants of historical revisionism to commonly held narratives regarding the Spanish colonial period in Latin America.
In 1948 he obtained a Masters in Philosophy and in 1951 he completed his doctorate in History with summa cum laude honorific distinction from the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM).
During his time at UNAM, O'Gorman met and developed relationships with distinguished Mexican intellectuals and Spanish refugees, such as José Gaos, who would greatly influence his later works.
He resigned after disagreements over concepts such as the "discovery of America", "encounter between two worlds", "cultural fusion" (or "natural mixing"), names he rejected and instead preferred the terms "empowerment", "domination" and others more according with history.
[2] He was a great admirer of authors such as José Ortega y Gasset, Wilhelm Dilthey, Benedetto Croce, Martin Heidegger, among other history writers[3] who kept disagreement with former Mexican historiography, which was full of extremism and with a leaning towards new, unedited documents.