Not long before Elvis Presley died in 1977, he bought a machine that allowed him to view microfilm.
His longtime friend Janelle McComb saw the device at his home of Graceland and told him, "You know, one day you're going to be a part of history. . . . One day, kids are going to be studying about you."And now," says McComb, "it's true."
Indeed, "Elvis 101" is a reality.
The official name of the course taught recently at the University of Mississippi is "In Search of Elvis: Music, Race, Religion, Art, Performance."
The text was pure Presley.
No grades were given at the International Conference on Elvis Presley, which is expected to be an annual event. The course lasts only six days. And at least one-third of the 150 participants this time around were members of the media. The other two-thirds included an odd assortment of scholars, fans and men in spangled jumpsuits who fervently believe Elvis is still the King.
Many of the scholars at the conference believe the study of Pres-ley and his impact on popular culture is here to stay.
Already, there's a course at Ole Miss, taught during the regular semester, that compares Presley's Hawaiian movies to author Herman Melville's books set in Polynesia.
Other Elvis courses are being taught or planned at such institutions of higher learning as Emory University in Atlanta; Mercer University in Macon, Ga.; Alcorn State University in Lorman, Miss.; and Birmingham (Ala.) Southern College. The study of Elvis has even been incorporated in courses taught in Japan.
Ayako Maeda teaches U.S. Southern literature at Ferris University for Women in Yokahama. "This year I'm using `Gone With the Wind' as a tool to teach Southern culture. Of course, I include Elvis, too," she says.
William Ferris, director of the Center for the Study of Southern Culture, a sponsor of the Oxford conference, makes no apologies for scholarly study of the singer.
"He's the most popular entertainer of the 20th century," says Ferris, no relation to the university in Japan. "This is a world-class opportunity to talk about someone that everyone is interested in."
The conference kicked off with performances by blues singers and Presley impersonators as well as a visit to Presley's birthplace in nearby Tupelo, where friends such as McComb offered loving memories.
But most of the time was spent in an auditorium in the Education Building on the Ole Miss campus, where academics presented their views on Presley's impact on music, race and religion.
Some lecturers at the conference believe Presley is worthy of study because of his role in race relations. They say his music, which relied heavily on blues music of the Mississippi Delta, opened opportunities for black artists.
"We didn't make much money until Elvis came and started twistin' and singin', and we've been making money ever since," says Arnold "Gatemouth" Moore, 82, known as the "granddaddy" of Beale Street blues singers in Memphis, Tenn.
John Shelton Reed, professor of sociology at the University of North Carolina, notes that Presley recorded his first song, "That's All Right, Mama," seven weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the concept of "separate but equal schools" in 1954. The case, known as Brown vs. Board of Education, effectively brought an end to segregation in the South.
"Presley came along just at a time when things were starting to change in a big way," says Reed. "White kids were listening to black music. They weren't quite ready to turn (black entertainer) Joe Turner into a superstar. But you get a good-looking white boy who's playing the same music, and you have the makings of a superstar."
Some academics plan to take what they learned at the conference about Presley and use it in their classrooms.
Barbara Haigh, a professor of English at Alcorn State, is developing a course looking at the blues as literature. Adrienne Bond, who teaches creative writing and poetry at Mercer University, plans to come up with a course examining the influence of popular music on contemporary poetry.
Others, like restaurateur Scott Rohde of Orlando, Fla., came to the conference, simply because they are huge Presley fans. Rohde says he saw Presley in concert 52 times and owns 25,000 Elvis photographs.
"It was thrilling to be at this conference," says Elvis impersonator Mark Hussman, a former drama major who believes playing Elvis is harder than doing Hamlet. "It's scholarly. It's artistic. There are so many facets, but it's tied with a genuine respect for Elvis."