I am editing another anthology called Contagion, that will be published
by the independent press, Kaya. It is the third in a series that Kaya
publishes (the second one, Collapsing New Buildings, is out now). I'm
looking for essays, short fiction, poetry, proposals for interviews, and
artists' projects.

CONTAGION: MUAE 3

At the edge of the next millenium, Malaysia's Prime Minister Mahathir
Mohammed has vowed to build a digital economy, challenging conventional
assumptions of the noble Third World savage, untainted by technology. In
the Third World, as in the over-developed world, the contagious speed of
daily life continues to transform our understanding of the borders of
nations, cities, and our bodies themselves. Immigrant workers, cyborgs,
criminals and agents of radical change are described as viruses,
increasingly in the wrong place at the wrong time. New ethnicities,
sexualities and identities are mutating and thriving.

What are the meanings of nativism and nationalism in a virtual world?
What are the implications of disease in a world defined by viruses,
where everything is, if not curable, then containable by multinational
medical industries? Contagion can be a way of describing the historical
moment of contact with civilization, the moment of invasion, the
impossibility of purity, the reality of mestizaje and the
interdependence of all things.

CONTAGION: MUAE 3 will look at a world that "is not inviolable, but
always already violated by man, the social, the bricoleur, jack, jill,
technology." CONTAGION: MUAE 3 will look at events such as the first
live, interactive dialogue on the Internet by a head of state,
Malaysia's Prime Minister, Taiwanese hackers defacing the ruling
Kuomintang Party's official web site and the Aum Shinrikyo cult's
release of poisonous gas on the Tokyo subway system. Through critical
essays, fiction, poetry and artists' projects, CONTAGION: MUAE 3 will
explore what is often left out of discussions of technology: the mostly
female Third World labor pool that manufactures it. Writers and artists
will explore the era of the recombinant, in which plagiarism has once
again become an acceptable, even crucial element of literature and art.
CONTAGION: MUAE 3 will look at the viruses that are reconfiguring
today's cultural and political landscapes.

My deadline for handing in material to my publisher is January 1, 1998.
You can send material directly to me c/o Kaya, 133 West 25 Street, #3E,
New York, NY 10001, USA. Email: kaya@kaya.com. Hoping that you will be
inspired to contribute something.