I think this could reasonably be pulled off with either a cleric or an oracle, honestly.
When I played WoW, the shaman was a generalist class, pretty good in melee, lots of Shocks (instant-cast, short-range attack spells) and had some healing ability. They could throw out AoE buffs (totems) and maybe summon allies.
Do they want to translate the mechanics of the shaman class (melee, elemental damage, totems)? If so I'd suggest a magus - you can combine melee and offensive magic pretty well there. Totems wouldn't translate particularly well, but everything else would.
If they want to translate over the roleplaying aspects of a shaman, that's probably closest to a druid without shapeshifting - maybe take the druid class and swap out wild shape for the magus's spell combat? That'd make a respectable nature warrior. There's a spirit shaman class in one of the 3E books but I was never that fond of it - it's mostly about dealing with ghosts.
The player mainly wants more of the RP value of the shaman, so lots of the nature and spirit end of things. From the way she described it, it kind of sounded like she wanted a kind of Druid/Paladin multi-class.
That sounds like either a druid or nature domain cleric. The Paladin/druid combination won't work without homebrew rules due to iron clad alignment restrictions. It also would be a poor multiclass in general due to lack of synergy.
The druid can give up his AC to take a cleric domain if the player doesn't want to play a "pet" class.
Druid would definitely be the best bet I would say...
The question I would have is 'does the character want to emulate a Shaman in general? Or does she want to emulate a certain Tree? (Enhancement/Elemental/Restoration)'
Because that will have an impact on how best to proceed...
The very first pathfinder character I made was intended to be an equivalent of my WoW character (An elemental shaman)..
It didn't work out too well since I was very new to the game and I was working with just the CRB... These days with all the material out there and more knowledge I think any of the paths could be mimicked quite well. So what does she want specifically?
If enhancement Magus. Flame lash, socks, novas built into the class. Not much on dual wielding though. If elemental I'd go with a fullcaster, if healer I'd do cleric or life oracle.
There isn't a good equivalent out of the core that I know. I'm sure theres a good 3rd party though.
Oh yeah, Enhancement Shaman would be solidly comparable to a Magus, with the Magus Spellstrike being comparable to the Shaman's Lava Lash and Stormstrike.
But that's strictly mechanics.
For RP value, she can flavor it however she wants, to have a more spiritual or nature-focused character.
Keep in mind, however, that the mechanics of the Magus can be a bit tricky for a new Pathfinder player.
If you want to avoid the relative difficulty of the Magus, think about having her go Barbarian and concentrate on the Totem abilities from the Rage powers.
I guess the thing to keep in mind too is to stress that while you can implement the mechanics of a Pathfinder class that she finds interesting, her roleplay character is strictly her own creation.
In WoW, when you pick Shaman, you play a Shaman. In Pathfinder, when you implement the mechanics of a class, that character can be flavored and 'refluffed' however you want, within the confines of the GM's discretion for what will and won't work in their game/setting.
So, in a much more wordy way I agree with Seranov.
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i would say a barbarian/druid mix if you wanted her to play the enhancement version of the shaman
a pure druid if she wanted to play an elemental shaman
and last a cleric, nature domain if she wanted to play a restoration shaman.
the barbarian should be duel wielding maces, or axes. the elemental/restoration shaman needs a shield, but you wont be able to completely mimic the totems without your gm giving you the ok.
*edit* oh i didnt read that you;re letting 3.5 material in. i wouldnt go barbarian/ druid i would change that to a dragon shaman/druid
dragon shaman have an aoe ability that would mimic many of the enh shaman core abilities like healing totem and a few others like resistance to energy and what not.
magus barbarrian
a pure magus could pull it off too