Day 29 SoL Story Challenge: A Mash-Up

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You know that phenomenon where once you learn about something, you start to see it everywhere?  Well, a few years ago, it seemed like  everywhere I turned, "mash-ups" were coming up. I'm a fan of the show Glee, where mash-ups were in vogue on the show for a while, and maybe they still are. Friends kept posting mash-ups to their Facebook "walls," and even in my doctoral program courses colleagues were taking on the concept of the mash-up as a tool for researching student identity and culture.

Here's an example of a mash-up, in case you're not familiar. DJ Danger Mouse mixes The Beatles with Jay Z to create this mash-up:

Mash-ups are so interesting to me because they often bring together elements of style, culture, and identity that might at first seem disparate, but when juxtaposed or mixed, the common threads pop out. The Beatles are larger than life, Jay-Z is larger than life (if you're a New Yorker especially), and there's a demographic that is attracted to both. The mash-up demonstrates how some of the same people who love the Beatles can also love Jay-Z. I find it very cool.

Anyway, I hadn't thought about mash-ups in a while. Then, tonight Little L. did this:

Go Little L., mixin' it up. Why let the limitations of one genre get in your way, when you can mash them up into a Poem/Song/Story combined?

What I love about L.'s mashup is that she's included her classic go-to's for each genre. She starts with a poem that goes "I am a wish box…" Earlier this month L. made up a similar poem about a "hello box." I loved it so much, that she repeats variations of it often--in the car, at the dinner table, while playing...  Next she moves into ABC's… classic. Finally, a chipmunk story. If you've been following Little L. and I this month, then you know she loves a good chipmunk story. All in all, her mash-up does a nice job summarizing the recurrent themes in her body of work to date!