Cultural Transgressor: Who Was Elvis Presley?

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Who was Elvis Presley? The king of rock ‘n’ roll is what people call even till this day, but who really was Elvis Presley? Was Elvis a cultural appropriator or a cultural transgressor? Michael T. Bertrand thinks that Elvis had a lot to do with music today. Taking African American music and making it into rock ‘n’ roll is what Elvis did, helping whites recognize how good their music was but also taking other peoples tunes and making more money off of them. We all have our own opinions on what we really think about Elvis Presley. Once rock ‘n’ roll came out white communities thought it was wrong, after a while it shaped racial attitudes because everybody liked this type of music, having this is common brought both races together. It started all with the youth during that time, they are the ones who followed and enjoyed the music even though it was looked badly upon by their parents. The youth is…show more content…
It was said that rock ‘n’ roll posed a threat because black and white working class performers who had southern roots and dialects could be successful among the middle-class audience. This challenged the entertainment industry because they had to look for the next person that was going to be a hit. They went on to exploit small groups that would make them money, making sure they were gained control over rock ‘n’ rolls subculture style. They wanted to target the middle-class white people but instead they decided to take care of the more extreme aspects of the music. In my opinion I think Elvis was both an appropriator and transgressor. An appropriator in the sense that he took African American music to make himself famous. At the same time he was also a transgressor because he broke the norm and started performing rock ‘n’ roll which was looked badly upon. While breaking the norms he made African American music more acceptable to white people because they see a white man performing the

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