Call for Chapters: Electronic Shaman: Nam June Paik, Shamanism, and Emerging Media On July 20, 1990, Korean-born video artist Nam June Paik (NJP) held a shamanic ritual in Seoul, Korea, commemorating his close friend Joseph Beuys, a German-born avant-garde artist. The performance was titled *Nam June Paik + Shaman Exorcism Rite + Joseph Beuys’ Memorial Service *(Jans, 2018). Through the ritual, Paik became a “medium,” a shaman “who connects the past with the future through reincarnating spirits and mourning for the other” (Cheon, 2009, p. 234). On January 29, 2007, a year after NJP’s passing, Kim Keum-Hwa, the renowned national shaman of the time, performed a shamanic memorial ritual for Paik in Seoul and resurrected him in spirit (Cheon, 2009, pp. 270-278). According to the memoir of Shigeko Kubota, NJP’s life partner, NJP took considerable pride in Korea’s cultural heritage of shamanism. NJP’s view on shamanism was more than performing or participating in shamanic rituals. He believed the core of Korean shamanism to be communication, so shamans should facilitate communication between/among or through beings. For him, Korean shamanism was the beginning of the world, as it allows humans to communicate with Heaven (or God). NJP’s emphasis on “an information-age realization that what is made is less important than how it is received” (Zinman, 2019, p. 82) makes clear how his works and vision are based on his belief in shamanism as communication. There are numerous publications on NJP’s life and works, but only a few in English on NJP’s video art works and shamanism, which is an important aspect of NJP’s oeuvre. Mina Cheon (2009), Young-Cheol Lee (2012), Wook Steven Heo (2018), and Mi-Jung Kang (2019) are among the authors with published work on these themes. Jung-Jin Park’s work (2010), although written in Korean, provides valuable and thorough insights into NJP’s world from the perspective of Eastern philosophy. The edited volume Electronic Shaman: Nam June Paik, Shamanism, and Emerging Media will focus on various interrelationships among NJP’s works and shamanism in emerging media contexts. The volume also attempts to illuminate NJP’s works in relation to dark shamanism and neoliberalism. Potential topics and themes might include but are not limited to the following: *Topics/Themes* - NJP’s works, shamanism, new materialism - NJP’s works, shamanism, Internet of Living Things (IoLT) - NJP’s works, shamanism, electromagnetic spectrum - NJP’s works, shamanism, social media - NJP’s works, shamanism, Artificial Intelligence (AI) - NJP’s works, dark shamanism - NJP’s works, (dark) shamanism, neoliberalism Please email abstracts of approximately 500 words to Joonseong Lee jlee@csusm.edu as a Word document by Sept. 15, 2024. In your abstract, please be sure to include a short bio for all authors of no more than 200 words. *Timeline* Sept. 15, 2024 - Chapter proposals (abstracts) due Oct. 1, 2024 - Decisions announced Mar. 1, 2025 - Full chapter draft due (expected full chapter length 6,000—8,000 words) *References* Cheon , Mina. Shamanism + Cyberspace. NY: Atropos press, 2009. Heo, Wook Steven. “The Influence of Shamanism on Nam June Paik's Video Art.” Moving Image Technology Studies, vol. 28, 2018, pp. 95-113. Jans , Rachel. “Nam June Paik: Kinship, Collaboration, and Commemoration.” San Francisco Museum of Modern Art, Aug. 2018, https://www.sfmoma.org/essay/nam-june-paik/ . Accessed July 7 2024. Kang, Mi-Jung. “The Sound of Shamans in the Works of Nam June Paik and Early Korean Video Artists.” ScienceOpen.com, Aug. 2019, https://www.scienceopen.com/hosted-document?doi=10.14236/ewic/RESOUND19.18. Accessed July 7 2024. Lee , Young-Cheol. “The Founder of Video Art Nam Jun Paik and Shamanism.” TK-21 La Revue, 2012, https://www.tk-21.com/TK-21-LA-REVUE-No15-24?lang=fr#The-Founder-of-Video-Ar.... Accessed July 7 2024. Park, Jung-jin. Reading Nam June Park’s Video Art by Kut: from Neo-shamanism to Eco-feminism, Seoul: Koreanstudies Information Service (KIS) (in Korean), 2010. Zinman, Gregory. "This Script is Not Final, and is Subject to Changes: Nam June Paik between Page and Screen." We Are in Open Circuits: Writings by Nam June Paik, edited by Hanhardt, John G, et al, The MIT Press, 2019, pp. 73-85. Joonseong Lee, Ph.D. Professor of Communication Department SBSB 2128 California State University San Marcos, CA 92096-001 Email: jlee@csusm.edu Office ph: 760.750.4134 https://www.csusm.edu/profiles/index.html?u=jlee