"When talking about Elvis Presley, no one asks "whose Elvis ," but the question might be worth exploring. As a tale of rags-to-riches, Elvis Presley should have epitomized the perfect American success story. And to countless numbers around the world, that exactly is what he represented. But this "Horatio Alger story in drawl" remains, to many in his own country, a pariah. A widely-read 1977 disapproving obituary written by syndicated columnist Mike Royko captured the ambivalence historically attached to Presley and the Southern white working-class culture that he personified. As the popular journalist surmised, "Elvis pulled off a marvelous con. There he was, a Depression-born, unread hillbilly, a marginally-talented pop singer" who "promoted a limited talent into a vast fortune...I think what Presley's success really proves is that the majority of Americans, while fine, decent people, have lousy taste in music." To many, Royko's inference that Elvis reigned as the "King of White Trash culture" merely stated the obvious. Once likened to a "jug of corn liquor at a champagne party," the hip-swiveling "Hillbilly Cat"-turned-B-movie star-turned-Las Vegas spectacle clearly never obtained the credentials necessary to rise above the caricatures and attain legitimacy. According to Simon Frith, Presley "was not just working class but, worse, Southern working class, [ the object of] a class contempt which, among other things, assumed that someone like Elvis was incapable of artistry." The chapter will examine this quandary. In doing so, it will place Presley within a context that sheds light not only upon the singer's life and career, but also on the American South of his birth as it relates to the United States of which it is a part. Using Elvis as a means to explore issues of region, class, gender, and taste, the chapter aims to expand our understanding of prejudice and discrimination. In particular, it engages with the work of Linda Ray Pratt, whose 1979 discussion of Elvis and Southern identity is used to consider the nuances of more contemporary political maneuvers"--
Decades after his passing, Elvis Presley remains one of popular music's greatest icons. He was among the most successful, influential, socially significant, and controversial performers of the twentieth century, with a celebrity so indelible that every recent American president has negotiated its orbit. While much of the coverage of Elvis' life concerns his personal history and musical ability, Rethinking Elvis pushes beyond the familiar to address Elvis' branding, historical and geographic reception, heritage, and fan phenomenon. Using Elvis' iconography as a point of departure, popular music scholars and historians contend with issues related to the performer's whiteness, Southern identity, and gender, among others, in turn offering myriad opportunities to pursue new approaches in the emergent field of Elvis studies.
In Rethinking Elvis, popular music scholars and historians look beyond Elvis' iconography to shine a light on the branding, historical and geographic reception, heritage, and fan phenomenon that sustain his legacy. By engaging with recent disciplinary shifts and ongoing conversations within the field, Rethinking Elvis pinpoints the many reasons for Elvis' continued influence on popular culture.
