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Most gallingly, Lottie is even viewed as a white woman, a view completely ignorant of the fact that both Courtney Eaton and Simone Kessell are mixed race Māori women, with Eaton additionally having Cook Islander and Chinese heritage. Kessell herself was intentionally cast as adult Lottie, as she mentions in two separate interviews with Glamour *1 and Buzzfeed *2. Given this intentionality on the part of the show runners, it is not a stretch at all to say that Lottie Matthews is Māori (and Chinese, and Cook Islander), and it is therefore critical that we ourselves be intentional in the ways in which we view the character.

Here's what we know for sure about Lottie, per the show. She comes from a wealthy family, with a father rich enough to provide a private plane for the Yellowjackets team to take to Seattle for Nationals. At a young age, she was diagnosed with schizophrenia and heavily and strictly treated for it. Her parents are divorced, with her father living in New York and her mother living with her in New Jersey with full custody over Lottie. After the surviving team members were rescued, Lottie was sent off to a Swiss institution to be treated for her mental health issues. Lottie, as an adult, lead what she called an intentional community of people who she aided in regard to their own mental health. Lottie was eventually killed by Callie, Shauna's daughter.

As for her time in the wilderness? Well, that's hard to say, because one of the overarching statements this show seems to be making is that our perception cannot always be trusted. Additionally, Lottie lives with a condition that causes her to experience reality differently than the norm, and this is an experience that no one else in the surviving group is privy to. Even we as the audience do not fully see or hear everything that Lottie does, as best exemplified during the group's seance scene where she suddenly came under attack by some otherworldly force that came from outside the attic window.

Despite this, there are several scenes during the teen timeline that are taken at face value by many in the fandom, and are used as evidence for their less favorable views of who Lottie is. So, even if the show itself is attempting to tell its audience to be skeptical of what we perceive, we will still discuss those scenes, specifically with regards to how these scenes are used by fans as a basis for who they believe Lottie to be.

So, who is Lottie Matthews?

I'll tell you who she is.

-----

Chamoru poet Craig Santos Perez wrote that, "Pacific Islanders have been represented as violent, primitive, hyper-sexual, exotic, childlike, cannibalistic, dependent, noble, athletic, hyper-masculine, uncivilized, and hospitable" *3. It's interesting to see that several of these qualities are in direct contradiction with each other, and yet they are all still applied as stereotypes of PI peoples. Obviously, when dealing with a show like Yellowjackets, some of these qualities become applicable. Lottie is an athlete, and during the teen timeline she does engage in cannibalism.

However, looking at the above list of traits ascribed to PI people, one cannot help but notice that most of the rest have at one point or another been applied to Lottie as well by the fandom at large. This is not to say that a PI person cannot be interested in sex, or cannot be violent, or cannot be masculine or hospitable. Rather, it is important when engaging with the character of Lottie Matthews that we ask ourselves why we might view her as any of the terms listed by Perez.

But where did these views of PI peoples come from, exactly?

European and American imperialists, mostly.

Hawaiian professor Maile Arvin, in a 2021 presentation about her book Possessing Polynesians, tells us "Indeed, since the earliest encounters between Europeans and indigenous Pacific Islanders, white Europeans and later, white Americans, express a fascination and partial identification with the racial origins of Polynesians ... while these theories shifted over time, the enduring logic that Polynesians could be understood as more natural or classical or otherwise primitive versions of white civilizations remained throughout changes in social scientific trends. This logic really persists to this day, from the daily exotification of light-skinned [Hawaiian] so-called hula girls as understood as naturally available sexual conquests for visiting white tourists, to complicated matters of legal recognition for Native [Hawaiian] people" *4.

In a 2024 interview, Professor Arvin further states that "Because of the way [Hawai'i] and other Pacific Islands are often sold to Americans and other international audiences, there is often a depiction of Pacific Islander women, Native Hawaiian women in particular, as naturally welcoming hosts who, to put it bluntly, are sexual objects for tourist men to receive. Those kind of stereotypes can be really harmful, because they increase the rates of sexual violence against Pacific Islander women" *5. This statement is reiterated by a report on Missing and Murdered Native Hawaiian Women and Girls put out by the Office of Hawaiian Affairs. The report mentions, among other things, that "today, Kānaka Maoli women continue to be sexually subjugated. For example, the iconic image of the scantly clothed, hip-shaking hula dancer is one that makes Kānaka Maoli women objects of sexual desire in the minds of foreign men. The commodifing and sexualizing of a sacred Kānaka Maoli art form (hula) is validated through ideologies of Kānaka Maoli women as uncivilized and needing salvation through relationships with white, western men" *6.

The perception of Lottie Matthews as being very sexually experienced, even being nymphomaniac, plays into the stereotypes that Professor Arvin mentions. These stereotypes have the real world effect of fueling an epidemic of missing and murdered indigenous women and girls, and thus it is critical that we exercise care when it comes to how we view and speak about indigenous characters.

Of course, being PI does not disqualify a person or character from being interested in sex; rather, the pervasive insistence that Lottie must be interested and that she must have a voracious sexual appetite should be examined closely for potential racial bias, especially given the dearth of evidence provided by the show. When we do examine the character within the context of the show we see that Lottie Matthews displays little, if any, sexual interest or desire towards anyone, regardless of gender. The only time she demonstrates any overt sexuality towards someone is during Doomcoming (which we will discuss later in this essay), and even that interaction was under the influence of a mind altering substance.

When trying to better understand Lottie Matthews' sexuality, we can turn to meta commentary done by tumblr user @softantlers for their observations on the character *7. As this post discusses, Lottie would have been under a great deal of surveillance once she and the survivors were rescued, which would have prevented her from exploring her sexuality for several years. Even before that, the show gives us very little in terms of demonstrating Lottie's interest in sex or sexuality, as opposed to characters like Nat or Shauna, who are shown to be interested in and having sex. In the second season, the most we see of teenage Lottie being involved in anything sexual is in connection with Travis. We have a scene where Lottie calms Travis during his panic attack and he has a sexual response that she ignores, and we have a scene where Travis appears to hallucinate Lottie as he's having sex with Nat. In both instances, Lottie does not engage sexually with Travis, and in the latter instance she is a figment of Travis' imagination.

It isn't until she's an adult that we see Lottie make reference to her potential sexuality, and it's a passing comment regarding not wanting a specific ingredient in her smoothie as it would impact her libido. She makes no mention of partners or experiences she's had, nor does anyone refer to partners or experiences connected to her. The sheer absence of sexuality flies in the face of the characterization that many in the fandom have of Lottie as being overtly and aggressively sexual.

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There is also the matter of the ways in which aggression is assigned to Lottie. Though she is just one member of a high school soccer team, a sport that is extremely high contact, Lottie is more often than not seen as the most aggressive of the team. This is not a new phenomenon when it comes to how Pacific Islanders are seen and portrayed. As noted by Susi Feltch-Malohifo’ou of the Utah based organization Pacific Island Knowledge 2 Action Resources, people who are not PI “assume we are aggressive; that we are bullying other people’s kids. We speak a bit louder, but we’re not angry; we’re passionate.” Feltch-Malohifo’ou also notes that “for every positive thing I send to the media, they pick out the negative things that are happening in our community” *8. Similarly, many in the Yellowjackets fandom not only pick out the negatives when it comes to Lottie's portrayal in the show, they also distort her actions into something they are not.

The fandom reaction to Doomcoming is a prominent example of how aggression is assigned more to Lottie than any other character. This is not to say that Lottie was not an aggressor against Travis; rather, it is telling that she is the primary one viewed that way. From start to finish, seven people were involved with sexually assaulting and nearly murdering Travis; Shauna, Mari, Akilah, and Lottie had direct physical contact with Travis, Van and Taissa participated in the confrontation of Jackie and Travis as well as the beginning of the sexual assault before breaking away to be alone together in the woods, and Misty was revealed to have been watching and not intervening in the attempted murder of Travis.

During the chase scene, Shauna is the first to reach for a weapon when she grabs the knife at the cabin, and Akilah is revealed to have picked up a large and possibly pointed stick during the chase to either bludgeon or spear Travis with. Additionally, these events occurred because Misty left psychedelic mushrooms near the food that Mari was preparing for the party, which Misty had intended to use to drug Ben with in order to assault him. And yet in the eyes of the fandom at large, Lottie appears to be the only one to have done any harm to Travis.

Out of the seven people involved in Travis' assault, the one most see as the aggressor is the person with Pacific Islander heritage.

When we take into account the ways in which Pacific Islanders are portrayed by the media, this is not surprising. A 2023 study on the reality show Police Ten 7 noted that "Māori/Pasifika suspects on the show are ... significantly overrepresented in five ANZSOC offence divisions: homicide and related offences ... sexual assault and related offences ... dangerous or negligent acts endangering persons ... fraud, deception, and related offences ... and property damage and environmental pollution ... This overrepresentation leaves Police Ten 7 viewers with the impression that Māori and Pasifika offend in these divisions at twice or three times the rate of their actual offending" *9.

The study further drove home this point in the conclusion, by telling us that it "found that Police Ten 7 severely distorts the offence categories with which Māori, Pasifika and European suspects are typically associated. Māori and Pasifika suspects are not only associated with a wider variety of offences and more often associated with violent offences than European suspects but are also overrepresented in violent offence categories compared to actual offending rates" *10.

There is also the perception of Lottie's relationships with Travis and Akilah to consider. Many in the fandom believe that Lottie forced Travis to consume psychedelic mushrooms or that she forced Akilah to inhale the cave gasses, in both cases to induce visions and establish a connection with the Wilderness. In both instances, this is false; at no point were Travis or Akilah forced to do anything, and indeed both of them exercised their own agency when interacting with Lottie. When Travis and Akilah rebuffed or diverted her away, Lottie did not push back. In fact, the only time anyone in the Wilderness was forced to consume something was during the force feeding of Ben when he stopped eating, an event that Lottie did not take part in.

It should also be noted that psychedelic mushrooms are not addictive. This is important to note because there are some in the fandom who would have us believe that they are, in order to reinforce their claim that Lottie was harming Travis with them. As the organization American Addiction Centers states "there are also no reports of physical dependence developing from chronic use of psilocybin" *11, which is further elaborated on by the Canadian Centre for Addictions who state that "unlike the iron grip of substances like alcohol, opioids, or cigarettes, psilocybin mushrooms don't sink physical hooks into users' biochemistry... When someone stops taking mushrooms, their body doesn't revolt with withdrawal symptoms – that telltale marker of physical dependence.Your system doesn't develop a biological need for psilocybin to function normally" *12. To say that Travis became addicted to psychedelic mushrooms is false, because you cannot become physically dependent on them. This claim is used to assign malicious intent and behavior to Lottie where there is none, and thus feeds into the stereotype of Pacific Islander people being aggressive and dangerous.

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There are those who allege that Lottie was lazy during her time in the wilderness, and that she did no work whatsoever. This is patently false, and completely ignores the work that Lottie did as a spiritual guide for the group. Mental labor is still a form of labor, and to ignore this in favor of calling Lottie lazy displays at best sheer ignorance as to what labor constitutes, and at worst is indicative of the pervasive hold the Protestant work ethic has on Western culture.

We see in the first season of the show that the Yellowjackets team divided up their labor by using the deck of cards. Which card a person drew determined what job they had, as we see in three separate scenes with Akilah, Misty, and Kristen/Crystal. Presumably, Nat and Travis were both exempt from this card draw being that they were the group's hunters. Why would this not also be the case for Lottie? Make no mistake, Lottie does perform labor for the group. Lottie, because of her connection to the Wilderness, becomes a spiritual guide for the other survivors. Lottie leads daily prayer meetings for the team, where she coaches them in what are arguably mindfulness exercises. These daily meetings not only improve the survivors' morale, they are also credited with helping Taissa with her sleepwalking. Lottie also rises in the mornings with Nat and Travis to bless them before they go out to hunt, and provides spiritual assistance throughout the day to each of her teammates. This is a role that she is thrust into by the others, notably by Mari and Akilah during the hunting contest between Nat and Lottie.

She also utilizes the knowledge she's gained in therapy to assist with the group's mental well-being, such as when she calms Travis during his panic attack. Lottie also attempts to perform this mental health aid for Shauna during her delivery, even if the attempt did not go as desired. When Shauna's delivery becomes especially dire, Travis gathers those not immediately helping into an impromptu prayer circle that utilizes the very same mindfulness techniques that Lottie had taught them in the daily prayer circle meetings. Even the sessions she holds with Travis where they use psychedelic mushrooms together are a form of therapy, despite the lack of professional supervision. Lottie consistently demonstrates that she does in fact work towards the group's survival by providing for them mental labor that, seemingly, no one else is able or willing to provide.

It's also worth explaining what exactly the Protestant work ethic is, and why the concept has come up in this discussion around Lottie's productivity. Put simply, it "is a concept emphasizing the belief that individuals have a spiritual duty to work diligently and use their earnings responsibly. Followers of this ethic, especially the Puritans who settled in North America, valued hard work and frugality, viewing these traits as indicators of one’s spiritual fate" *13.

Make no mistake, when early missionaries encountered indigenous peoples, they forced their views regarding labor onto them as part of their efforts to proselytize to the people they encountered. As Shawn Malia Kana‘iaupuni cites, missionaries coming to Hawai'i saw “not a system of working in the cool morning and resting later, but people ‘lazy and indolent.’ Not the natural order of eating when hungry, sleeping when tired, but ‘an entire lack of system’" *14. Missionaries in Australia, even if they supposedly sympathized with the right of the Aboriginal people to maintain ownership of their ancestral lands, also believed that they needed to work hard to maintain that right. Jessie Mitchell writes of the missionaries that "their descriptions of nomadic hunter-gatherer life as disgracefully wasteful and idle were also undoubtedly influenced by their Evangelical Protestant belief in the virtues of thrift, diligence, and self-improvement, the minimisation of “waste” time and the elevation of worldly work to a religious duty and even a blessing. [William] Thomas, for example, lectured Aborigines in 1841 that if white men were as lazy as they, God would punish them by sending a drought to destroy half the earth" *15.

These attitudes regarding the work ethic of indigenous peoples have not gone away. In an article published by Mission to the World, a missionary supporting ministry, writer Patrick Lennox mentioned that "when folks hear of the plagues in Native America such as addictions, violence, and suicide, they are quick to attribute it all to government handouts that are keeping Native Americans lazy, which in turn causes them to drink because of all the time on their hands, ... the shrewd potential donor would ask, “What is the point of sending missionaries to Native America? They are not really poor, just lazy”" *16. Crucially in this article, no mention is made regarding why Native American individuals might be suffering. There is only the belief that they need Christianity to deliver them from their "brokenness."

It should be noted that colonialism, of which missionaries and missionary culture benefits from and influences, is directly responsible for the various forms of suffering that indigenous peoples all over the world live through in their daily lives. As Mitchell wrote, "starvation was not necessarily the greatest danger for beggars, missionaries believed. Rather, protector [William] Thomas and missionary George Langhorne warned that Aborigines’ ability to beg decent food made them lazy, ungrateful, and discontented, less likely to submit to missionary authority" *17. In the eyes of missionaries, the worst thing that an indigenous person can be is insufficiently obedient to the will and authority of the ones proselytizing to them.

This is not to say that there is religious intent behind the belief that Lottie Matthews is lazy. However, given that Western culture is greatly influenced by Abrahamic religions, and that Christianity is especially deeply rooted within Western culture, we cannot ignore the possibility that this belief about Lottie is influenced on some level by religious attitudes regarding work. With this in mind, and knowing that there is a long history of Western culture imposing its views on work and labor onto cultures that do not share those views, it is vitally important that we be mindful in the ways we view those who come from non-Western cultures, even if their work ethic does not align with what we believe to be correct.

Furthermore, even if we the viewers see Lottie's labor as inadequate, it's clear that the Yellowjackets team does not feel the same way. There is overt social pressure on each member to pull their own weight, and we know this because of Shauna and Jackie. When the group's menstrual cycles have all begun, we see that they all continue to do the daily tasks needed for their survival. Jackie, however, lags behind the rest, and there is clear frustration from the others at her lack of productivity. Shauna eventually pulls Jackie aside and attempts to teach her how to butcher the animals Nat and Travis bring back, before telling Jackie that the rest of the group is taking notice of Jackie's unwillingness to pitch in. Even if we are still unwilling to consider Lottie's mental labor as sufficient, there are in fact instances where she helps with physical labor. On the day Jackie's body was burned, Tai asked Lottie to retrieve another log to be chopped. That same day, after the decision to cremate Jackie had been made, we see Lottie and Tai carrying Jackie's corpse to the pyre. Though these are only two instances, it is clear that Lottie is performing labor in a fashion and at a level that satisfies the group. It's telling that Jackie's lack of labor is seldom brought up whereas Lottie is frequently called lazy by many in the fandom, when this is untrue both in the eyes of the survivors and according to the text of the show.

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Of course, when we talk about how the fandom has treated the character of Lottie Matthews, we should also consider that the attitude of ignoring her indigeneity did not start with the fans. The show runners of Yellowjackets have, from the start, flirted with the idea of indigeneity, but have yet to commit in any meaningful way. In a 2025 interview Tawny Cypress, who plays adult Taissa Turner, revealed what she knew regarding the naming of the Yellowjackets hometown of Wiskayok, stating that "Lenape, the Native American tribe, is a Jersey nation, and they have words — Manasquan and all these words — of towns all over New Jersey. So Ashley and Bart [Nickerson] went and found somebody who speaks Lenape, and Wiskayok roughly translates to is “killer girls” or something. It’s pretty crazy. It’s a deep dive" *18. Notably, this interview came out in 2025, several years into the show's run. It is, frankly, bizarre that a detail like this has been withheld for so long, and we can only speculate as to why it was.

Nevertheless, rather than choose to establish the hometown of the team in a real place or to use a generic English name, the show runners are credited as having intentionally sought out someone who spoke an indigenous language and asking for a word with a meaning that would tie into the story they are telling. This makes the naming of Wiskayok an active choice, especially when we consider that the show runners have also intentionally made ample use of deeply symbolic imagery and iconography from various sources such as religion and mythology.

(An aside; as some fans have noted, there is resemblance between the Antler Queen imagery and a certain folkloric figure. Out of respect for the indigenous cultures that figure comes from, this essay will not name that figure nor will any further mention be made of it, and anyone who engages with this work is expected to do the same.)

Furthermore, there was a demonstrated intentionality in the casting process for Lottie's adult actor. In an interview with Vulture Courtney Eaton states that "I’m part Asian, part Islander, and I don’t often see that many actresses who are a similar heritage to me" *19. The show runners very clearly made an effort to be conscious of this, as they then cast Simone Kessell. In an interview with Glamour, Kessell mentions that she "loved that they honoured Courtney's ancestry and where her parents are from" *20. Kessell also spoke with Buzzfeed, stating that "in 2025 especially, you have to really acknowledge people's ethnicities and diversity and background, and they really did ... it was very important for them to make sure they cast in ethnicities, and they did that really well" *21.

It is vital to not understate just how important it is that the show runners were conscious and respectful with regards to keeping the character of Lottie Matthews PI in both her teen and adult portrayal. It is also important to note that this was most likely all that the show runners did on their own to engage with the actors' indigeneity. Kessell mentions in an interview with The Cut that she was the one to come up with Lottie's koru tattoo, and to implement its portrayal in the show *22. This is not the only time an actor from a racialized background has needed to add more to the show to make it more realistic or truthful to their lived experience. Regarding season two, Jasmin Savoy Brown mentioned in an interview with Collider that "we've seen more scenes with Taissa and Akilah, and I’m definitely a part of that. Let's be honest, if there's two black girls in a group and they're the only two, they’re gonna stick together, especially in a survival scenario. And Nia [Sondaya] and I both believe that that's happening a lot more off screen than we happen to see on screen. But I've been championing that from the beginning that we see that and so it's nice that that got taken into account” *23.

Make no mistake; it is good that the show runners listen to their cast when suggestions are made, both for the story we see on screen and for the actors' own well-being, as Nia Sondaya tells us in an interview posted to YouTube regarding Akilah's hairstyle in season three *24. However, that does not exempt them from criticism for any creative choices they've made that mirror real world harm that impacts marginalized groups. Even if we accept that Yellowjackets is a show where all the characters will be dead by the end of the story, it is still important to acknowledge the framing each of those deaths takes place in. Whereas white characters like Nat, Laura Lee, and Van have more heroic deaths, characters like Lottie do not. Nat, Jackie, and Van die in less visually graphic ways than Lottie does, do not have their bodies displayed in sensational ways, and are shown to have been given some form of funeral or memorial. Conversely, as we see in season three, there is an effort on the part of Lottie's white father to have her death ruled as an accident. This does not even begin to touch on the deaths of characters like Mari and Kristen/Crystal, and others as we move into season four.

With regards to Lottie specifically, her death in the show is a fictional example of a real world problem that affects indigenous people; Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women, Girls, and Two Spirit people. Not only is Lottie killed in a sensational way, and her body displayed in a sensational manner, but she is also killed off specifically for the character advancement of Callie Sadecki, who is white. It's also worth noting that this is not the first time that Callie has behaved aggressively towards other characters, as we see when she dumps animal entrails onto three of her classmates. Notably these three classmates are portrayed by racially ambiguous actors, and one of the classmates is given the name Keiko, as we see in the credits of the episode It Girl. Callie, like her mother Shauna, has a history of behaving violently towards others, and the show runners made the choice to have her kill Lottie. In choosing to kill Lottie off in this manner, they chose to do so in a way that was undignified for her as a person and meaningless for her character arc. This lack of care for Lottie Matthews' part in the story is disappointing, especially when we consider how much care is put into so many other parts.

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While it is not necessarily inherently wrong to imagine a fictional character any particular way, it is important to ask ourselves why we do, and to be mindful of any potential biases that may be coming into play. Lottie Matthews is, like all of the characters in Yellowjackets, a complex and multi-faceted character. She is not wholly good, but neither is she wholly evil. Lottie is human, just like everyone else in the show, just like everyone who watches the show.

She is also indigenous, by virtue of being played by two indigenous actors, one of whom was intentionally cast for the role due to being someone of Māori descent. Choosing to ignore this is choosing to engage with only the most superficial aspects of her character. The characterization of Lottie as being aggressive does not encapsulate all of who she is as a person, and the ideas that she is lazy or extremely and overtly sexual has no basis in the text of the show. Even if these ideas of who Lottie is are well meaning, they have the unfortunate side effect of playing into harmful stereotypes about indigenous peoples.

The absolute dearth of indigenous representation, and especially of Pacific Islander representation, makes the presence of even just one such character extremely meaningful to those who long to see a part of themselves reflected in the media they consume. We are fortunate to live in a time where we can see more and more of these portrayals with each coming day. This does not, however, erase our responsibility to treat the portrayals we currently have with care.

Reducing Lottie to the worst aspects of herself, and to characterize her as someone she is not for arbitrary reasons, is to make her nothing more than a cardboard cut out in terms of dimension. There is more to her than what we might see on the surface with a cursory glance, and Yellowjackets as a show seems to demand of us that we look beyond what we initially see. Yellowjackets tells us that our initial perceptions might not always be correct, and that we should be wary of becoming set in our assumptions.

There is immense suffering that Lottie lives through and even causes to others. But that's not all there is to her, and to focus only on that is to make her something she is not. It is, to use a turn of phrase, to miss the forest for the trees. In that same vein, there is great sorrow experienced in indigeneity, and there is also great joy to be found. To ignore our joy, to focus only on the saddest parts of us, is to wear our experiences like a costume. To reduce us as indigenous peoples down to only the worst parts of our lives and histories is a demonstration of how little you know us as people and how little interest you have in getting to know us.

Lottie Matthews means so much to so many people. Her inclusion in the show has given some in the fandom a point of connection with others with similar lived experiences. There is so much joy to be found in genuine connection, and Courtney Eaton and Simone Kessell, in their dynamic performances of the character they share, have given us an avenue for that connection. Our ability to connect with each other is what has allowed humanity to survive for so many thousands of years, but we cannot meaningfully connect with each other if we operate from a place of ignorance.

In the words of the poet Craig Santos Perez, "I invite you to learn more about the histories and cultures of the Pacific by reading our literatures, listening to our voices, recognizing our strength and humanity, empathizing with our struggles, and supporting our fight" *25

Mahalo nui kākou. A hui hou, mālama pono.

"Ua Mau ke Ea o ka ʻĀina i ka Pono."

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Work cited:

*1 Jabeen Waheed, "Simone Kessell, the breakout star of Yellowjackets, on diversity in Hollywood, the beauty of motherhood, and the expectations of playing 'Antler Queen' in season two," Glamour Magazine, March 31, 2023, https://www.glamourmagazine.co.uk/article/simone-kessell-yellowjackets

*2 Morgan Sloss, "Simone Kessell Revealed If She Would Return For "Yellowjackets" Season 4, And She Surprised Me," Buzzfeed, May 01, 2025, https://www.buzzfeed.com/morgansloss1/simone-kessell-interview-voices-of-the-pacific

*3 Craig Santos Perez, "New Pacific Islander Poetry," Poetry, July/August (2016), accessed August 31, 2025, https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/articles/89705/new-pacific-islander-poetry

*4 Maile Arvin, ""The Polynesian Problem": Western Studies of Pacific Islander Origins: Peabody Museum of Archaeology & Ethnology," March 17, 2021, virtual, web video, 1:04:48, https://peabody.harvard.edu/video-%E2%80%9C-polynesian-problem%E2%80%9D-western-studies-pacific-islander-origins

*5 Matilyn Mortensen, "Reducing anti-Pacific Islander bias on campus, a Q&A with Maile Arvin," theU. The University of Utah, January 26, 2024, https://attheu.utah.edu/uncategorized/reducing-anti-pacific-islander-bias-on-campus-a-qa-with-maile-arvin/

*6 Nikki Cristobal, "Holoi ā nalo Wāhine ‘Ōiwi: Missing and Murdered Native Hawaiian Women and Girls Task Force Report (Part 1)." Office of Hawaiian Affairs, December 2022, https://www.oha.org/wp-content/uploads/MMNHWG-Report-Web.pdf

*7 @softantlers, "Fr about your take on canon Lottie's sexual experience.," Are You My Keeper? (tumblr), August 20, 2025, https://www.tumblr.com/softantlers/792439454831968256/fr-about-your-take-on-canon-lotties-sexual?source=share

*8 Sunita Sohrabji, "Pacific Islanders Are Misrepresented in Mainstream Media," American Community Media, July 2, 2024, https://americancommunitymedia.org/race-relations/pacific-islanders-are-misrepresented-in-mainstream-media/

*9 Antje Deckert, Wairua Taru Grant Busby-Pukeiti, and Juan Tauri, "“Young Brown Men Being Brutish”: How Police Ten 7 Portrays Māori and Pacifica People as Violent and Criminal in Aotearoa New Zealand," Journal of Global Indigeneity Vol. 7, Issue 1, (2023), https://www.journalofglobalindigeneity.com/article/77757-young-brown-men-being-brutish-how-police-ten-7-portrays-maori-and-pacifica-people-as-violent-and-criminal-in-aotearoa-new-z2aland

*10 see note 9 above.

*11 "Psychedelic Drug Effects, Side Effects & Dangers," American Addiction Centers, October 25, 2024, https://americanaddictioncenters.org/psychedelics

*12 Seth Fletcher, "Are Psychedelic Mushrooms Addictive? Risks Explained," Canadian Centre for Addictions, April 14, 2025, https://canadiancentreforaddictions.org/are-psychedelic-mushrooms-addictive/

*13 "Protestant work ethic," EBSCO, accessed October 23, 3025, https://www.ebsco.com/research-starters/history/protestant-work-ethic

*14 Shawn Malia Kana‘iaupuni, "Ka'akālai Kū Kanaka: A Call for Strengths-Based Approaches from a Native Hawaiian Perspective," Educational Researcher, Vol. 33, No. 9 (Dec 2004): 26-32, accessed August 31 2025, https://www.jstor.org/stable/3699821

*15 Jessie Mitchell, ""Country Belonging to Me”: Land and Labour on Aboriginal Missions and Protectorate Stations, 1830-1850," Eras Journal Ed. 6, (November 2004), https://www.monash.edu/arts/philosophical-historical-indigenous-studies/eras/past-editions/edition-six-2004-november/country-belonging-to-me-land-and-labour-on-aboriginal-missions-and-protectorate-stations-1830-1850#:~:text=(Australian%20National%20University),embracing%20hard%2C%20regular%20agricultural%20work.

*16 Patrick Lennox, "Have We Become Cynical about Native American Missions?," Mission to the World, June 30, 2016, https://mtw.org/stories/details/have-we-become-cynical-about-native-american-missions

*17 Mitchell, ""Country Belonging to Me”

*18 Erick Massoto and Perri Nemiroff, "There's Great Meaning in the Name "Wiskayok" in 'Yellowjackets' and We Know What It Is," Collider, Feb 28, 2025, https://collider.com/yellowjackets-season-3-hints-clues-tawny-cypress/

*19 Roxana Hadadi, "Yellowjackets’ Courtney Eaton on Lottie’s Heel Turn, Cast Theories, and Her Favorite Needle Drop," Vulture, January 9, 2022, https://www.vulture.com/article/courtney-eaton-yellowjackets-lottie-doomcoming-interview.html

*20 Waheed, "Simone Kessell, the breakout star of Yellowjackets,"

*21 Sloss, "Simone Kessell Revealed,"

*22 Bindu Bansinath, "Simone Kessell Wants to Throw a Very Kiwi Dinner Party," The Cut, April 17, 2023, https://www.thecut.com/2023/04/simone-kessell-yellowjackets-lottie-interview.html

*23 Perri Nemiroff, "'Yellowjackets' Season 2: Jasmin Savoy Brown Shares a Change She Pushed for That Happened," Collider, May 06, 2023, https://collider.com/yellowjackets-season-2-jasmin-savoy-brown-interview-taissa-akilah

*24 kfunggg, "Nia Sondaya Talks Akilah's Fate After the Yellowjackets S3 Finale, New Dynamics, and Those Visions," Apr 16, 2025, virtual, web video, 54:50 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tY3NwQrg3Gs