onfines of Eurocentric thought" (115). The essay focuses on the miracles, cures, and biblical allusions in Cabeza de Vaca's narrative, especially his Christ-like activities. Reff traces the opinions of various scholars about Cabeza de Vaca's role as healer and stresses the role of intertextuality in the text-formation process of Cabeza de Vaca's account, especially the Bible and hagiography. The essay also stresses how any critique that Cabeza de Vaca and his compatriots were "able to manipulate the Indians by instilling fear in them" in order to "render the Indians passive or at worst irrational" exaggerates Cabeza de Vaca's "abilities as a proto-ethnographer" (132). Reff concludes by suggesting that today's scholars comprehend the Indian's fears of Cabeza de Vaca more than Cabeza de Vaca himself ever did.
- Resendez, Andres. "Cabeza de Vaca and the Problem of First Encounters." Historically Speaking 10.1 (2009): 36-38.
- Resendez examines the problems of what isn't said in Cabeza de Vaca's Narrative -- namely, the cruelties enacted upon native tribes during his journey -- and explores the different attitudes towards slavery in the New World. Resendez wonders why Cabeza de Vaca was reluctant to fully describe European atrocities the latter had witnessed and offers a possible explanation with some historic context. Resendez also describes the different roles African slaves would have in Europe and the New World and illuminates the differences between European and Native American slavery as a way of showing how Cabeza de Vaca survived as a shaman in North America.
- Silva, Alan J. "Conquest, Conversion, and the Hybrid Self in Cabeza de Vaca's Relacion." Post Identity 2.1 (1999): 123-46.
- "My goal is to interrogate the relationship between colonizer and colonized . . . and to understand how an 'outsider' and an 'insider' can retain his conqueror's mentality yet simultaneously become more sympathetic to native customs, how an 'Indianized' Spaniard can both recognize the problems inherent in the concept of 'discovery,' but still wish to colonize the natives."
Cabeza de Vaca, Alvar Nuñez. The Journey of Alvar Nuñez Cabeza de Vaca and His Companions from Florida to the Pacific, 1528-1536. tr. from his own narrative by Fanny Bandelier. New York: A. S. Barnes, 1905.
- Espanoles en la Golgo de Mexico. Dir. Apolonio Torres. Films for the Humanities, 1986.
- This Spanish language video examines the role of Spain in the development of the United States. It offers a brief history of the discovery of Florida and traces the journeys of Cabeza de Vaca and Hernando de Soto.
- The West. The People. Dir. Ken Burns. Turner Home Entertainment, 1996.
- Volume one of a video series originally produced by WETA-TV titled "Ken Burns Presents the West," examines the original Native American inhabitants in the American West. The video contains an examination of Spanish conquistadors Cabeza de Vaca and Coronado, the Pueblo people of the Southwest, the Lewis and Clark expedition, and America's purchase of the Louisiana territory.
- Alvar Nunez Cabeza de Vaca http://www.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/vaca.htm
- This site includes a variety of links to Cabeza de Vaca sites and sites related to the exploration of the Americas. It includes a link to online editions of Cabeza de Vaca's Relacion, including an online edition of Cyclone Covey's 1961 English translation Adventures into the Unknown Interior of America.
- Archive of the West http://www.pbs.org.weta/thewest/wpages/wpgs610/cabeza.htm [Archived]
- This site from the PBS series "The West" includes a link to a full version of Fanny Bandelier's 1905 translation of The Journey of Cabeza de Vaca, as well as general information on the explorer.
- Cabeza de Vaca Page http://www.lonestar.texas.net/~mseifert/cabeza.html
- A Palo Alto College site that contains biographical information on Cabeza de Vaca and links to a variety of English and Spanish language Cabeza de Vaca websites.
- Cabeza de Vaca's Background Page http://www.webcom/sheppard/cab-back.html [Archived]
- Donald Sheppard provides a brief biography 