The Thammasat University Library has newly acquired two books in Thai language about the societal impact of a famous singer. The books were generously donated by Ajarn Charnvit Kasetsiri and are shelved in the Charnvit Kasetsiri Room on the U1 level of the Pridi Banomyong Library, Tha Prachan campus. Elvis is by Wirat Setthapramot.

Chronology of the Elvis Presley Aura in Thai Society 1957-1973 (Kālānukrom Elvis Presley thī prākot nai sangkhom Thai, Phō̜. Sō̜. 2500-2516) is by Nitaya Kanchanawan, Ph.D. Dr. Nitaya has written a number of books about teaching Thai language. They are available for loan from the TU Library Interlibrary Loan (ILL) service.

Elvis Aaron Presley (1935 –1977) was an American singer, musician, and actor, a popular musical artist and cultural icon. He is widely known by the single name Elvis. Although Elvis mainly expressed himself about music and other performance-related subjects, he occasionally wrote about more general subjects. Among the thoughts he noted down on his personal copy of the Bible are the following:

• To judge a man by his weakest link or deed is like judging the power of the ocean by one wave.
• There is a season for everything, patience will reward you and reveal all answers to your questions.
• Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain’t going away.

Although it may seem unusual to think of a popular singer as a subject of academic research, Ph.D. theses have been written about the international influence of Elvis. One such was at Åbo Akademi University, the only exclusively Swedish language multi-faculty university in Finland. It is located mainly in Turku but has also activities in Vaasa. The author, Dr. Sven-Erik Klinkmann, analyzed the significance of Elvis in terms of folklore. At Louisiana State University and Agricultural & Mechanical College, USA, Dr. Daniel Weaver Heaton wrote a dissertation in the Department of Speech Communication, Postmodern Messiah: A Critical Ethnography of Elvis Presley as a Site of Performance.

Dr. Heaton’s abstract explains:

In this study I used a critical ethnographic approach to investigate Elvis as a site of performance where cultural identity, authority and representation are contextualized within the cultural practices of fans, people who love Elvis, and funs, people who do not love Elvis, but still elect to use Elvis as the basis for their cultural performances. I argued that fans and funs use performance as the agency of postmodern identity construction. I explored three performance events in which both fans and funs participated. Additionally, I examined the relationship of power and play between and within fan and fun culture. I positioned fan and fun activities as cultural performances that enact political ideologies supported by members of fan and fun cultures. I focused on fans and funs as performers who enacted material, verbal, and processual texts. I detailed these performances in three case studies…

Dr. Mark Duffett is Reader in Media and Cultural Studies at the University of Chester, United Kingdom. Dr. Duffett earned a Ph.D. with a thesis on the fans of Elvis Presley. He has published a number of books about popular music, fan culture, cultural theory, and Elvis. One of his scholarly articles uses the writings of the noted French sociologist Émile Durkheim to better understand the Elvis phenomenon. In Applying Durkheim to Elvis, Dr. Duffett writes:

Elvis Presley has always had a very prominent and loyal fan following. In this article I argue that although Elvis fans are not substituting him for a deity, we can use one mechanism from Emile Durkheim’s theory of totemic religion to understand the human chemistry of his phenomenon. Specifically, I argue that fans offer their collective attention to Elvis in exchange for the thrill of a real or imagined individual encounter with him as a star of such magnitude. In other words, Elvis’s popularity is not incidental to his phenomenon, but has always been the medium through which his music talent has actualized itself. This does not make Elvis “sacred,” like a “god” or an object of worship. His entertainment is so thrilling because he, as an individual, adeptly channels the “buzz” of meeting someone so famous. His myth as a humble country boy also intensifies the thrill, making Elvis the ultimate popular icon.

All Thais are familiar with Elvis, especially after HM King Rama IX and HM Queen Sirikit met Elvis during a visit to Paramount Studios in Hollywood, California in 1960, where Elvis was starring in a musical film, G.I Blues.

The TU Library collection owns a number of books in English about the life and influence of Elvis Presley.

TU students may be aware that there is an Elvis Presley Fan Club of Thailand and Elvis’ films have long been dubbed into Thai language and made available on VCDs.

One of the leading experts on Elvis lived in Thailand for many years. Jerry Hopkins, who died last year in Bangkok, was an American journalist and author. He moved to Thailand in 1993. Mr. Hopkins was the author of Elvis: the Biography. Mr. Hopkins also wrote Thailand Confidential and Bangkok Babylon: The Real-Life Exploits of Bangkok’s Legendary Expatriates are Often Stranger Than Fiction.

All three books are in the TU Library collection and are available in the General Stacks of the Pridi Banomyong Library, Tha Prachan campus. There is an additional copy of Thailand Confidential in the General Stacks of the Puey Ungphakorn Library, Rangsit campus.

Mr. Hopkins also wrote a foreword to a memoir by Father Joseph (Joe) H. Maier, an American Redemptorist priest who lives and works in the Khlong Toei slums of Bangkok, where he co-founded the Human Development Foundation (HDF-Mercy Centre) with Sister Maria Chantavarodom. Father Joe Maier, who will be 80 years old in October, has worked in Bangkok for over 45 years, concentrating on impoverished communities. One of Elvis’ famous songs, In the Ghetto, was likewise concerned with poor people. It begins:

As the snow flies
On a cold and gray Chicago mornin’
A poor little baby child is born
In the ghetto (in the ghetto).

Elvis wannabes

Although Elvis impersonators are found all over the world, especially in Asia, Thailand has become known as a center for this mimicry. A documentary film, The Three Kings of Bangkok focused on a few of Thailand’s best-known Elvis impersonators. One of them, Jibb Vasu Sansingkaew, suggests that some of Elvis’s elaborate costumes resemble traditional Thai garb. The film was directed by Alden Nusser as part of his master of arts degree at the City University of New York (CUNY) Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism in 2015.

(all images courtesy of Wikimedia Commons)