Álvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca and John Grady Cole: unhorsing the figures of the conquistador and the cowboy in America

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dc.creatorOjeda, Maria Del Pilar
dc.date.accessioned2016-11-14T23:20:51Z
dc.date.available2011-02-18T18:55:07Z
dc.date.available2016-11-14T23:20:51Z
dc.date.issued2002-05
dc.degree.departmentEnglishen_US
dc.description.abstractThe model of conquest presented by Cabeza de Vaca in relation the New World has been traditionally interpreted as an example of an anti-conquest in comparison to the ones performed by Cortes or Pizarro. However, from a post-colonial perspective, Cabeza de Vaca's account of the New World can also be claimed to be the triumph of an acculturation process. Similarly, John Grady Cole's journey to Mexico in order to discover a mythical place for cowboys results in the failure of an original colonial plan and the success of a cultural exchange. Both Cabeza de Vaca in Naufragios (1555) and John Grady in Cormac McCarthy's All the Pretty Horses (1992) experience the shape of a new man who finally emerges as a complex amalgam of intercultural diversity. Throughout the long and winding adjustment, the mythical figures of the Spanish conquistador and the American cowboy are constantly tested and reinvented in the new setting proving, at the end, that the conquerors are in fact conquered. These stereotypical figures' failures when confronting the new reality of America are best illustrated by comparison with Don Quixote's actions in the second part of Cervantes's novel, which provides an appropriate scenario of the slow descent of these anachronistic warrior-type figures. The image of the Spanish hidalgo works also as a juncture to characterize the romantic features of the conquistador and the cowboy. In addition, the role of a subversive feminine Nature inside pro-masculine narratives plays a crucial part in reversing the masculine characterization of all of these male figures as mythic and imperialistic figures. Hence, the conquistador and the cowboy share a previous antecedent in the type of the knight and, in this case, a common origin as vaqueros testifying to Spain's current presence in the southwestern literature of the United States.
dc.format.mimetypeapplication/pdf
dc.identifier.urihttp://hdl.handle.net/2346/8594en_US
dc.language.isoeng
dc.publisherTexas Tech Universityen_US
dc.rights.availabilityUnrestricted.
dc.subjectCole, John Grady (Fictitious character)en_US
dc.subjectCowboys -- Mexicoen_US
dc.subjectCowboys -- United Statesen_US
dc.subjectConquerers -- Mexicoen_US
dc.subjectNúñez Cabeza de Vaca, Alvar, 16th centuryen_US
dc.subjectNúñez Cabeza de Vaca, Alvar, 16th century. Relación y comentariosen_US
dc.titleÁlvar Núñez Cabeza de Vaca and John Grady Cole: unhorsing the figures of the conquistador and the cowboy in America
dc.typeDissertation

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