Letteratura scientifica selezionata sul tema "Moon – Exploration – Juvenile fiction"

Purpose: to trace how the representative Russian science fiction texts reflect the process of the exploration of the Earths satellite, both in scientific/technical and socio-philosophical aspects. Methods: comparative-historical, mythopoetic, socio-historical, hermeneutical, structural analysis. Results: Konstantin Tsiolkovsky, the outstanding rocket scientist and pioneer of the astronautic theory, in his story On the Moon conjectured in detail the impression of an observer on its surface. The Soviet science fiction writer Alexander Belyaev developed Tsiolkovskys hypotheses in the story The Star KETs in which the Moon becomes accessible due to the construction of a space station in Earths orbit, named after the scientist: Star K(onstantin) E(duardovich) Ts(iolkovsky). In the Soviet Union, which was actively engaged in the research of the Moon, the interest in it was so great that it was reflected even in childrens literature. Simultaneously with the deployment of the Soviet lunar program, a fairy-tale novel by Nikolai Nosov Dunno on the Moon appeared. The novel shows the atmosphere of rivalry between the USSR and the United States in the exploration of the Moon. The science fiction vector is unfolded in the picaresque genre. In Victor Pelevins novel Omon Ra the question is raised not only of the research prospects of lunar landings, but also of the spiritual price of scientific search which implies the active participation of the state: is a free intellectual and technical search possible for astrophysicists, engineers, and cosmonauts under the pressure of acute political necessities?

Humans are unique as a species because, with the help of well-defined problematics, humans alone are capable of redefining reality. A problematic can be understood as an exceptionally-challenging intellectual objective (e.g., heavier-than-air flight, building the first atomic bomb, curing disease, landing humans on the moon, developing artificially-intelligent computers, constructing faster-than-light speed spacecraft, etc.) that requires knowledge-seekers to invent new facts and redefine reality in order to achieve the hoped-for objective. Although scientists prefer to think that scientific inquiry is constrained to an exploration of empirical facts, in truth, scientific progress is often instigated more effectively by the pursuit of a compelling problematic—in many cases, even by science fiction fantasies (Shatner, 2002)—rather than by an examination of established empirical facts (McGettigan, 2011). As such, science has proven to be the most effective means ever invented by humans to transform fantasies into reality.

This paper provides a broad review of the UK’s interest in human spaceflight (HSF), covering its past, present and possible future. It looks at the origins of the national interest, starting with the British science fiction “visionaries” HG Wells and AC Clarke from the early 1900s. Considering what might have been if governments had more fully invested in UK HSF activity during the 1960-80s, it notes that despite a positive cultural enthusiasm the UK appears to have been held back by institutional scepticism and a lack of government financial commitment - this attitude strongly contrasted with that of other developed nations, particularly Germany, France and Italy. Following a sudden reversal of government policy for human space activity post-2008, a deeper HSF involvement by the UK now seems achievable, depending on sufficient funding - ESA’s 2022 selection of three new British astronaut candidates is a very positive step-forward. The paper broadly considers the opportunities via the combination of human and robotic exploration (HRE) with direct microgravity research on the ISS and the forthcoming private space labs in LEO, plus participation in NASA-led “Artemis” lunar exploration. The latter could involve applied UK space industry initiatives, possibly including lunar navigation and communications satellite construction, Gateway space-station services, plus potential nuclear power sources for a future Moonbase. Space-based solar power with HSF support, expanding space tourism activity, then the future exploration of the Moon and Mars may then be followed by ISRU exploitation and commercial space mining. The paper concludes with a revue of the importance and need for HSF for space research and exploration, it’s “value for money”, potential long-term futures and the contribution HSF makes to the “Big History” of humanity as a space-faring species. Keywords: Astronauts, Human spaceflight (HSF), Arthur C Clarke, European Space Agency (ESA), UK Space Agency, Tim Peake, Artemis, SUSIE, ISS, Orion, Argonaut, Moonbase, World History

Current scientific developments have reached the stage where human aspirations of space exploration are not science fiction but a reality involving travelling to the Earth’s orbit, the Moon and Mars. In the second half of the twentieth century, international space agencies (like NASA, European Space Agency, and Russia) witnessed the professional experiments of official and commercial space projects, gradually unveiling the universe’s secrets. Astronautical research has predominantly been developed within the context of advanced materialism. The astronauts’ physical health has been protected by the technology of space medicine, while the socio-cultural aspect of psychological well-being was less regarded. As space-travel time is getting longer and more solitary, the evaluation of the mental environment of the astronauts during space travel or in technical crisis is necessary. Also, can the private sphere of astronauts help the public sphere of space safety or security? When and how can religious behaviour (or psycho-religious potentiality) be effective in the space community of long-term missions? This paper explores the sacred experiences of past astronauts in the non-scientific aspects of fearlessness, courage, stability, and confidence. It argues a new hypothesis that while the space team can theoretically depend on the visual and systematic data of the latest information technology (IT) and artificial intelligence (AI), the success of deep space missions (including Mars exploration), in terms of human risk management, is not always irrelevant to the strength of individual spirituality as an internal countermeasure of self-positivity in absolute hope. Furthermore, this aspect can be proved in the case studies of the American Christians’ willpower, Papal support, spontaneous Jewish astronauts, the institutional cooperation of the Russian Orthodox Church and its government, and the commitments of Asian and Islamic astronauts.

As Aeschines famously said, phēmē (‘fame’) can't be trusted: that's why ‘famously’ so often prefaces a mistaken report. Karen ní Mheallaigh knows that in Gorgias B23 it is the sophisticated audience which is deceived, and she understands the ‘contractual’ relationship that Gorgias posits between audience and author (e.g. 30, 32, 78). But, making the fatal mistake of calling it ‘Gorgias’ famous dictum’, she hallucinates a reference to madness and says that ‘what is at stake…is the confusion between reality and representation, which is a measure either of the audience's lack of sophistication, or of the artist's supreme skill’ (29). Her invitation to ‘read with imagination, and with pleasure’ (xi) succeeds admirably. Reading her exploration of the self-conscious, extremely sophisticated, and persistently playful fictionality of Lucian (Toxaris, Philopseudes, True Stories) and others (Antonius Diogenes, Dictys and Dares, Ptolemy Chennus) was, for me, an intensely stimulating and pleasurable experience. But the Gorgias aberration was not the only thing that also often made it annoying. ‘The irony that pervades Lucian's work…is not a symptom of exhaustion but of exuberance’ (37): doesn't that state the obvious? ‘Having read Toxaris, it is difficult to read Chaereas and Callirhoe without feeling its improbable storyishness’ (49): is that any less difficult for those who haven't read Toxaris? ‘Is Toxaris a dialogue about friendship, or about fiction?’ (67): the headline answer (‘both: for the theme of friendship is itself entwined with the dynamics of fiction in the dialogue’) is undercut by what follows, which reductively treats the friendship theme as a pretext and pretence (‘in Lucian's work, fiction is almost invariably enjoyed under the pretext of doing or talking about something else, and Toxaris is no exception: it is a dialogue about novelistic narrative, masquerading as a dialogue about friendship’; my emphasis). A fictional speaker's oath ‘compels the reader into acquiescence that the story he is listening to is true’ (68, original emphasis): how is that possible when (given the existence of perjury) even non-fictional oaths don't have that power? Is it true that a ‘constant oscillation between the poles of belief and disbelief…takes place in the reader's mind when (s)he reads fiction’ (70)? The internal audience may be waveringly doubtful about the status of what they are hearing, but sophisticated external audiences of fiction are capable of maintaining a complex attitude free of oscillation. ‘The reader must wonder whether (s)he is him or herself contained within that remote specular image on the Moon, a minute mirror image of a reader and a book, within the very book (s)he is now holding’ (226): that's not the ‘must’ of necessity, since I don't wonder that at all. Am I violating some ‘must’ of obligation? But why should anyone be obliged to wonder anything so daft? I was not disturbed by ‘the disturbing idea that every reality may be a narrative construct, another diegesis in which we are the characters, being surveyed by some remote and unseen reader, perhaps right now’ (225; compare 207), nor unsettled by ‘the unsettling possibility that the real world outside Lucian's text could be just as fictional, if not more so, than the world inside the book’ (230; compare 8). If you are of a nervous disposition, do not read this book: thirty-six occurrences of ‘anxiety’ and ‘anxious’ might make you jittery. Otherwise, read it, enjoy it, and (from time to time) shout at it in frustration.

This paper aims at discovering factors that play vital role in the alienation and marginalization of masses by ‘State Apparatuses’ that not only compel them to show unwavering obedience to state but also force them to sacrifice their right to freedom and will. It will spotlight some modes in which suppressed people resist against state apparatuses in order to secure their freedom. The aim of this research is to provide a platform to those silent voices or lost groups which have never been represented in the state narratives. Discussing the socio-political scenario of Federally Administrated Tribal Area, this work speaks the unspeakable things via deconstructing the bitter facts about the particular region: Mir Ali. Bhutto’s The Shadow of the Crescent Moon challenges the mainstream narratives where the third world nations either have no representation or a negative presentation. Giving the voice to the voiceless, Bhutto’s fiction explicitly describes the narrative of the masses of FATA because, before that, we have only one dimension of narrative that is state’s narrative. For useful exploration and analysis, the idea of ‘repression and resistance’ will be discussed with reference to Louis Althusser’s ‘Ideology of State Apparatus’. For this purpose the primary text shall be deconstructed at all levels.

AbstractMining for natural resources on-Earth is commonplace and dates back over a hundred years at an industrial scale. Technological advances in outer space exploration are enabling the mining of extraterrestrial resources to transition from mere science fiction, to a serious possibility. In recent decades, several new start-up companies have arisen with the sole intention of exploiting resources that exist in outer space, such as on Earth’s moon, asteroids, meteorites, planets, and various planetary satellites, such as the moons of Mars - Phobos and Diemos. However, despite the increased investment and interest in space mining, criminologists have remained virtually silent on outer space issues. In this paper we adopt a green criminological approach to explain the emergence of outer space mining, and argue that now is the time to be researching and debating the phenomenon of extraterrestrial mining in order to prevent future social and environmental harm (following the precautionary principle of environmental law). To do this, the paper does three things. Firstly, it examines strategies for conducting space mining (such as its feasibility, probable locations, and innovative mining techniques). Secondly, it analyses the terrestrial and extraterrestrial impacts of space mining, unveiling several avenues for the creation of social and environmental harm. Finally, it uses a green criminological approach to justify the rationale for engaging legal scholars and criminologists with problematic space mining issues. The paper concludes that now is the time to discuss these issues, prior to the industrialisation and exploitation of unique celestial bodies.

McAllister, Ian, and Nicholas Read. The Sea Wolves: Living Wild in the Great Bear Rainforest. Vancouver: Orca, 2010. Print At first glance, The Sea Wolves is a small coffee table book. It is not, however, just a pretty photographic exploration of the wolves that inhabit The Great Bear Rainforest. It is a very long opinion piece written expressly to convince readers that wolves are not “the big bad wolf” of stories; rather, we should all love and respect them. Authors Ian McAllister, a founding director of both the Raincoast Conservation Society and Pacific Wild, and Nicholas Read, a journalist, pull no punches in their attempt to sway the reader. While the book does present facts about the wolves and their environment, many of them likely accurate, the authors make sweeping statements and claims which they require the reader to accept at face value. For example, though the authors state that there is “a great deal of evidence to suggest that over-fishing, fish farms and climate change have all played a role in [the wolves’] decline,” this statement does not direct the reader to any evidence. Part of the purpose of the book is to educate the reader about the wolves; however, it is also clearly designed to manipulate the readers’ emotions. The authors attempt to get the reader to identify with the wolves through anthropomorphizing the animals and by drawing extensive parallels between the lives of wolves and the lives of people. For example, they state that the reason that wolves save the “tastiest deer” for their young pups “could be because, just as in human families, wolf families like to spoil their babies.” Furthermore, throughout the book, the authors choose emotionally-laden words and images, stating, for example, that wolves “have been persecuted by humans, with a kind of madness,” or that they “romp on the beach in the ocean foam that burbles off the waves like bubble bath.” Each interpretation of the wolves’ behaviour seems designed to achieve the desired effect of garnering sympathy for the creatures. While there is nothing wrong with writing a polemic against the dangers to wolves and their environment, this book is presented by the publisher as juvenile non-fiction for ages 8 and up. Children in upper elementary or even junior high school grades may have difficulty distinguishing between facts and strongly-worded opinions presented in a book labelled as non-fiction. Recommended: Three stars out of fourReviewer: Sandy CampbellSandy is a Health Sciences Librarian at the University of Alberta, who has written hundreds of book reviews across many disciplines. Sandy thinks that sharing books with children is one of the greatest gifts anyone can give.

A curious sense of the past, the present, and the future is evoked when I consider the sweeping curves and gleaming surfaces of the rocketships, rayguns and UFOs beloved of 1950s SF illustrators and filmmakers. A sense of the past, of course, because they are things of history, designed and conceived at the pre-dawn of the space age, and representing an old aesthetic and innocent notions of infinite progress and glistening technology. Modernity, pure and distilled. A sense of the present, because these designs and aesthetics are constantly being reworked, re-modelled, re-contextualised and re-incorporated into new images and artefacts by highly reflexive and postmodern designers. In them, I also see the future, because the present imagery of space travel is somewhat lacking in boldness and excitement. Humans went to the Moon a few times in a stubby little module, left most of it behind, and never returned. Whereas in the old movies (Forbidden Planet, Destination Moon, Flash Gordon), we elegantly traversed the ether in giant rockets that looked like interplanetary cruise liners. It's a strange nostalgia, to feel that we lost something we never really had. The second world war temporarily suspended the production of designed consumer artefacts, as the production resources of nations were funnelled into military purposes (McDermott 17). The devastation that the war caused meant that resources and money were in short supply for many years -- it was not until the 1950s that Western economies had sufficiently recovered for excess to come back in fashion. With it came new materials and technologies like nylon and anodised aluminium, developed for the war effort, and soon to be channelled into commercial applications. The explosion in fashion and industrial design has been called by Leslie Jackson "The New Look", after Christian Dior's "New Look" spring collection of 1947 (Jackson 7). The extravagance of Dior's New Look was initially funded by the French Government, eager to exploit the nation's reputation for excellence in design. There was initial hostility to such extravagance from nations inured to hardship and utility, but this soon dissipated (8). Overwhelmingly, a post-war austerity was replaced by a "vision of the future" (McDermott 19). Nowhere was this vision more evident than in the excitement over space exploration (21). Science and design again interacted at a high level and the symbols of the atom and the rocketship became central motifs in the New Look (21), harking back to Art Deco, the style movement of the 1920s, which was one of the first movements to apply contemporary technology to design. Industrial design became highly influenced by the organic sculpture of Moore, Calder and Arp (McDermott 20), and the preference for curving, fluid shapes became evident in everything from automobile design (complete with rocket fins) and interior decoration (20). It was a period where the visions of the future seemed to perfectly match the reality. Anything seemed possible. Space exploration was gearing up, Science Fiction was in its golden age, authors such as Heinlein, Asimov, Bester and Clarke were at the height of their creative powers. The UFO movement began in force with the activation of American military groups investigating sightings. Science Fiction films, when they weren't agitating over pseudo-communist alien menaces, depicted space travel as effortless and everyday occurrences. And the tool by which this was accomplished was the rocketship. There was a democratic notion of technology attached to these early visions of interplanetary craft: plot lines would frequently revolve around inspired individuals constructing their craft in back yards and sheds, sponsored by enlightened commercial interests. Truly, the American Dream. Technology and power that anyone could access, wrapped in a free-market ideology that was, ironically, almost eliminated by the billion dollar budgets of the resolutely governmental NASA Apollo projects, but still lives on in the cult of hobbyist miniature rocket builders. Much of the inspiration for the shape of those rocket ships undoubtedly sprang from the same well as contemporary aircraft design (indeed, many leading SF writers of the time were trained physicists and engineers). Central themes in the rocket designs were cigar shaped bodies, sweeping wings and foils; they usually took off like aeroplanes as well. This aesthetic stayed in SF illustration and filmmaking until the late 1960s, when Kubrick's 2001: A Space Odyssey and the success of the Apollo missions changed the design paradigm forever. No longer were spaceships smooth tapering rockets. No longer did aliens arrive in spinning metal discs. In their place were textured and massively detailed objects, the functional products of heavy industry. Star Wars added speed, dirt, and rust to the equation. And so it remained, until the 1990s. The 1990s have become a time of (certainly not quiet) reflection, of looking to the past for fashion and philosophy, to rework, to revisit. In the early 1990s, music became the target, and first the 1960s, then the 70s, then the 80s were plundered for riffs, lyrics and attitudes. That's died down -- stealing from the early 1990s would be galling even for Oasis. Two very different media forms, Cinema and computer games, have taken up the challenge of stealing from the past. The 1980s are at last a definite historical era; ripe for parody, even if it can't be taken seriously just yet. And digital art makes the old look newer than ever. Like a pristine and gleaming Ed Wood movie, Tim Burton's Mars Attacks made the flying saucer cool again; The X-Files reworks the hoariest of horror and B-movie clichés with knowing, post-modern humour. The instruction manual for the computer game Fallout hilariously revisits 1950s cold war nuclear paranoia with cartoon diagrams depicting duck and cover techniques. In the game itself, a crashed flying saucer (complete with large headed skeletal remains) delivers to the player a powerful raygun (which despatches the mutant foe with a dayglo disintegration effect) and a velvet covered photograph of Elvis. These icons have remained with us, transformed, almost forgotten, from the age of the Atom (to rework Nicholas Negroponte) to the age of the Bit. If the visionaries are right, we might be headed back to atoms, with the oncoming Age of the Nano: technology that's constructed atom-by-atom into motors, circuits and eventually, perhaps, robots. If it happens, the economic and ideological constraints on our cultural and industrial production will fall away almost over night. Freed from our limitations, who's to say that the space vessels of the future might not take any shape we wish -- even those old fond shapes of our distant memory? The rhetoric is exciting, but I'm reminded of the optimism about atomic power. Time will tell. References Collins, Michael. Towards Post-Modernism: Design since 1851. London: British Museum Press, 1987. Jackson, Lesley. The New Look: Design in the Fifties. Manchester: Thames and Hudson: 1991. McDermott, Catherine. Essential Design. London: Bloomsbury, 1992. Pye, David. The Nature and Aesthetics of Design. Bethel, CT: Cambium Press, 1978. Citation reference for this article MLA style: Nick Caldwell. "Rocketships, Rayguns and UFOs: Memories of Kitsch SF Iconography." M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 1.2 (1998). [your date of access] <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/9808/sf.php>. Chicago style: Nick Caldwell, "Rocketships, Rayguns and UFOs: Memories of Kitsch SF Iconography," M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 1, no. 2 (1998), <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/9808/sf.php> ([your date of access]). APA style: Nick Caldwell. (1998) Rocketships, rayguns and UFOs: memories of kitsch SF iconography. M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture 1(2). <http://www.uq.edu.au/mc/9808/sf.php> ([your date of access]).

In Showtime’s Yellowjackets (2021-present), ‘magic’ (referred to by the characters as “It”) has an overwhelming presence. Supernatural visions, clairvoyance, and occult iconography are laden throughout each episode. However, the audience is often left uncertain if magic is, in fact, ‘real’ or conjured in the imagination of the show’s characters. Yellowjackets follows a women’s high-school soccer team (named the Yellowjackets) who survive a plane crash deep in the North American wilderness. The show explores the team’s struggle for survival and the present adult lives of those who survived. In this article, we draw from Caroline Bainbridge’s understanding of television as a psychical object to investigate the role of magic in Yellowjackets’ exploration of grief and trauma. We provide a close textual reading and an analysis of online fan discourse to explore the ambiguity of magic and its capacity to generate meaning. We argue that it is precisely through the ambiguity surrounding the ‘realness’ of magic that Yellowjackets can effectively explore grief, trauma, and empathy. Ultimately, we contend that the ambiguity of magic in Yellowjackets helps viewers empathise with the trauma and grief experienced by the characters. The Ambiguity of Magic in Yellowjackets Magic has often been seen by scholars as an effective artistic tool to explore trauma and grief narratives (Bowers). As Maggie Ann Bowers puts it, magic helps create a space where the “unrepresentable can be expressed” (77). Scholarship surrounding the literary genre of magical realism offers a particularly useful exploration of exactly how magic can be an effective avenue to explore such themes (Arva; Abdulla and Abu). Beatrice Chanady defines magical realism as the amalgamation of realist and supernatural/magical elements. In her understanding of this genre, both realism and magic are “equally autonomous and coherent” (18). In a similar vein, Wendy Faris observes that the narratives of magical realism “merge two different realms”, and as a result the reader may “experience some unsettling doubts in the effort to reconcile two contradictory understandings of events” (101). Indeed, it is the merging of these two worlds that allows for the symbolic exploration of trauma narratives. In the case of Yellowjackets, these elements of magical realism certainly come into play. As we will explore throughout this article, the tension between realism and the supernatural is precisely what allows Yellowjackets to “say what cannot be said” (Mrack 3). The idea of magic is a constant presence throughout both seasons of Yellowjackets. However, the realness of this magic is always ambiguous and up for debate. Much like The X-Files (1993-2002), the textual features of Yellowjackets can allow for both ‘sceptic’ and ‘believer’ readings of the show that are not expressly affirmed or denied (Goode). Magic is first hinted at in the opening sequence of the pilot episode when an unnamed character (referred to affectionately by fans as “pit girl”) is chased into a crude spike trap. The sequence is laden with occult imagery—there are mysterious eye symbols carved into the trees and the other girls are wearing ritualistic masks made from animal skin and antlers. As the show progresses, the other characters start to openly speculate about the supernatural magic of the wilderness. One of the central characters, Lottie Mathews, starts having ‘visions’ that seemingly align with the strange occurrences of the forest. As she starts to surrender to the call of the wilderness her magic appears to grow stronger. In the season one finale, “Sic Transit Gloria Mundi” (S1E9), a bear threatens the Yellowjacket’s camp. Lottie steps forward to face the bear armed with only a small knife. Through seemingly accepting the call of the wilderness, the bear lies down and submits to her without a fight. For many of the other characters, this affirms Lottie’s magic powers, and they anoint her the “Antler Queen”. Of course, these instances of ‘magic’ can just as easily be explained as coincidence. Lottie is shown to have an established history of mental illness and magic is never clearly shown—it is just alluded to an entity that has an invisible presence. The uncertain allusion of magic has a divisive effect on the girls in Yellowjackets. The survivors organise themselves into pseudo-factions depending on their belief in the supernatural powers of the wilderness. Characters in the wider group including Shauna, Natalie, Taissa, and Misty are quick to reveal their scepticism toward Lottie and the existence of magic. To begin with, this group tension is relatively minor—the sceptics find the believers silly and dismiss Lottie as simply being “crazy”. However, group tension becomes more significant as it starts to influence the decision-making of the whole group. After another group member, Javi, goes missing, Travis (Javi’s older brother) and Natalie spend hours each day searching for him in the freezing cold. This search is resource-consuming and dangerous because the pair could easily get lost or succumb to frostbite. Natalie quickly realises the search is futile, as it is extremely unlikely that Javi could have survived on his own. In the episode “Friends, Romans, Countrymen” (S2E1) she is on the verge of convincing Travis to give up when Lottie mentions that she had a vision about Javi and is certain that he is alive, inspiring Travis to continue the search. Frustrated, Natalie confronts Lottie: Natalie: What the fuck was that!? Javi is… Look giving him false hope is just going to make things worse.Lottie: There’s no such thing as false hope. There is just hope.Natalie: Did you read that in a fucking fortune cookie?Lottie: What do you want from me Nat? I said what I felt.Natalie: I want you to say less, Lottie, a lot fucking less! As situations like this become more common, relations between the believer and sceptic factions in Yellowjackets become more fractured. It quickly becomes clear that magic and its ambiguity in the show is a divisive source of conflict. The impact that magic has on the characters in Yellowjackets is seemingly mirrored in fan communities—particularly the r/Yellowjackets subreddit. As outlined by Victor Costello and Barbara Moore, online fandoms have the capacity to transform the private act of viewing into a communal activity that significantly enhances one’s emotional involvement with a text (124). Meaningful exchanges in online discussions empowers fans to “organise en masse as resistors and shapers of commercial television narratives” (Costello and Moore 124). On the r/Yellowjackets subreddit debate about ‘magic’ and whether the supernatural is a real force is a central theme, one poll that received over 800 responses asked users whether there were “supernatural/dark powers lurking, or no? Is it just mass hysteria with the perfect storm of events” (Reddit). There was nearly a complete split in the vote, with 401 users agreeing that there is an ancient, evil magic impacting on the characters and 460 indicating that there is no magic in the show. The lack of consensus in the fandom has led to countless disagreements within posts as users enthusiastically debate the legitimacy of magic. As seen in Figure 1, users on the subreddit can select a ‘flair’ (a tag of text that appears under usernames to give additional context to a post or perspective) to denote their allegiance to “Team Rational” or “Team Supernatural”. Users adopt these flairs to place their opinions and arguments into a particular context of thinking. Intense arguments erupt as a result of the ambiguity surrounding magic, with fans speculating using clues from the text. Will Brooker has suggested that debates can be a source of pleasure in fan communities and are what allows them to “thrive” (113). In the case of r/Yellowjackets, the debate about magic is a form of productive conflict that is very much part of the fun of watching the show (Brooker). It encourages fans to sleuth for specific textual evidence that both supports their position and shapes their interpretation of the Yellowjackets narrative (Costello & Moore 124). Forum identity is heavily connected to the implied supernatural elements of Yellowjackets, and this uncertainty results in factional splits much like the groupings displayed on the show itself. Fig. 1: Available Flairs on r/Yellowjackets subreddit (2023). How the users of r/Yellowjackets interrogate and draw their conclusions about the authenticity of magic in Yellowjackets impacts on their perceptions of the show’s paratextual discourse (Gray). As the show is ambiguous in its messaging to do with the supernatural, users have many different wells of meaning to draw from. These include specific characters they trust (like Lottie and Nat), the communication tools of the text (shots, audio, lighting, mise-en-scène, etc.) and the show's creators. Some users trust the legitimacy of Lottie as a true clairvoyant who “consistently has visions of the future” (Reddit). Others rely more on what the audience has been told about the characters, particularly regarding Lottie’s schizophrenia. One user questions whether they are “the only one who didn't really pick up on occult?” and continued that they had read “everything more as Lotti [sic] slipping into whatever mental illness she has and pulling others into her delusions when nothing supernatural is actually happening. More cult than occult” (Reddit). Many fans on the subreddit implicitly trust the writers’ paratextual discussions about the show. Series creators Ashley Lyle and Bart Nickerson frequently comment on and confirm previously ambiguous elements of the show (Chaney). Actors like Christina Ricci (who plays an older Misty on the show) have also debunked audience theories (Weiss). One user argues they “trust” the writers on questions of ambiguity. Statements like “writers have confirmed” become commonplace in these debates, with users citing writers' comments as to why much of the supernatural is merely a figment of the characters’ imagination. Other posters are sceptical of writer discourses, preferring to trust the texts themselves rather than rely on creators who either may not know the answer or who benefit from ambiguity. Whatever and whoever fans believe influences their perception of the show and who to trust, users look to varied show elements as the locus of meaning and truth regarding magic, and whom they choose to believe changes their perspectives and impacts on their engagement with the show and the characters. ‘Who the fuck is Lottie Mathews?’ Magic, Meaning and Empathy Yellowjackets’ textual exploration of grief and trauma is so often mediated through the idea of magic. As Yellowjackets progresses, the girls find themselves in increasingly hopeless situations. Characters die, freezing weather confines them to a cabin, and their food supply becomes almost completely exhausted. The girls are often forced into impossible situations where they must choose between cannibalism and starvation. These declining conditions are what lead many of the ‘believer’ characters (Van, Mari, and Travis) to their intense faith in Lottie as a human conduit upon which the wilderness has bestowed magic powers. Magic offers some meaning to the brutality and hopelessness of their situation. As things get worse for the girls in season two, ‘sceptic’ characters slowly start to accept the idea of magic. Nat starts receiving blessings from Lottie, Taissa begins attending Lottie’s prayer circle, and Shauna allows prayer during the birth of her child. When faced with dire situations, ‘magic’ offers the characters a way to confront their violent actions and absolve themselves of responsibility for horrible decisions. For example, in the season two episode “It Chooses” (S2E8) the Yellowjackets decide that they must resort to killing and eating one of their teammates in order to survive. The group agrees that, through the magic red queen ritual designed by Lottie, the wilderness will decide who is to be ‘sacrificed’. In this instance, the idea of magic is used by the girls as a psychological tool to distance themselves from the trauma and grief that are inherent to their situation. Throughout Yellowjackets the characters in the present timeline are shown to still suffer from the intense trauma and guilt of their time in the wilderness. For example, Natalie is in and out of rehab programs and Taissa suffers dissociative sleep-walking episodes. Most notable in this regard is the character of adult Lottie. In the opening montage of “Friends, Romans, Countrymen” (S2E1) we see the range of psychological treatments that Lottie has gone through since returning from the wilderness. For the first few episodes of season two, it appears as though adult Lottie has managed to heal and move on from the past. She has set up a ‘commune’ that is seemingly having a positive influence on the lives of new characters like Lisa and (to an extent) former Yellowjackets like Nat and Misty. However, soon after her old Yellowjackets teammates re-enter her life, we see Lottie become increasingly unstable. She is frequently shown to be having intrusive thoughts and violent visions about her time in the wilderness. In this sense, Lottie’s reunification with the other Yellowjackets is a trigger for her repressed grief and trauma. As season two progresses, there are several scenes of Lottie receiving therapy from an unnamed psychiatrist. While these sessions start off relatively innocuous, they gradually become more sinister as Lottie opens up about her time in the wilderness, and finally her feeling of “It” returning: Therapist: Lottie, when does self-repression ever serve us? It could be that this reunion strikes a primal chord with you because in the past when you were with those other women you were free. You were your truest, most authentic self. What is standing in the way of you embracing that again?Lottie: We hurt each other. People died.Therapist: Tell me, is there anything of value in this life that doesn’t come with risk? Or loss? Or consequence?Lottie: Are you saying what I think you’re saying? At this moment the therapist transforms into the antler queen, dressed in a white ceremonial robe that is adorned with bones and symbols of the wilderness and it is revealed that Lottie has been hallucinating the entire session. The scene concludes with the therapist (in the form of the antler queen) telling Lottie: “You tell me, does a hunt that has no violence feed anyone?” From this moment, adult Lottie embraces the magic of the wilderness again. It is the only way she can find meaning in and confront the trauma and grief that she still holds from her time in the wilderness. This ultimately leads to Lottie convincing Shauna, Van, Misty, and Taissa to believe in the supernatural magic of the wilderness again and perform the deadly Red Queen hunting ritual as adults. Giving in to magic allows the characters a chance to escape the trauma and grief and give meaning to their violent actions in the wilderness. In this sense ‘magic’ in Yellowjackets is somewhat of a psychological sleight of hand for characters to artificially separate themselves from their past. Caroline Bainbridge has emphasised how the immersive environments created by a television program allow audiences to work through themes in very personal ways. According to Bainbridge, complex story worlds can be critical tools to help viewers work through complicated issues. In essence, audiences may “internalise drama as an object of the mind but also put it to work in their everyday life” (300). She argues that we should begin to understand how a television show can become a psychical object, available for use in terms of unconscious interrogation of one’s sense of selfhood and one’s immersion in a complex ideological environment. (300) Understanding long-form television as this type of object allows us to recognise a similar potential within Yellowjackets. Leaving magic as an ambiguous feature allows audiences to empathise and engage with the characters’ uncertainty; just as they are left to wonder about the state of reality and magic, so too are the fans on forums. One user explores how the characters’ uncertainty creates discussion and debate within a group of people ‘trapped’ together: what I really like is the way the potential for paranormal is implied in the girls’ situation by these odd coincidences, adding to the group psychosis and shared trauma… they’re scared shitless at the drop of a pin out there, and questioning everything they see (or don’t see), which adds to the anxiety. (Reddit) Much like the characters on the show, the fans have become a group trying to make sense of ‘odd coincidences’ and are ‘questioning’ everything they can see (on the show) and everything they ‘don’t’ see (writer and cast interviews). This ambiguity has led some fans to connect more closely with the character of Lottie, who seems to truly believe her visions are real, with some even “defending” her decisions and perspectives throughout the show (Reddit). Others are also impacted upon by the possibility of magic in the show, but rather react like Shauna and Nat—if there is magic it might not be helpful. One user identifies a kind of meta-experience fans are having thanks to the possibility of magic in the show: when [the writers] were asked if the show believes in the supernatural they kind of paused and started talking about the concept of believing in the supernatural, without saying if it definitely exists within the realm of the show. Which is kind of meta, as we're all discussing whether we believe in the supernatural existing within the show or not. (Reddit) As outlined by Mittell, Andrejevic, and Bainbridge, participation in TV fan communities allows for fundamentally different engagements with a text. In the case of r/Yellowjackets, it “significantly enhances” fans’ emotional involvement with the show (Costello and Moore) and brings new textual experiences to the fore. It is only through fan debate and community participation that fans can experience this ‘meta-narrative’ of magic. In this context, magic in Yellowjackets operates as a tool to connect audiences with the experiences of their characters. The consequences of unknown supernaturality and magical elements cause strife throughout fan communities much like in the community of the cabin in the show. Fans are shown how characters might ostracise, argue, deflect, and rationalise when their reality is questioned, much like the Yellowjackets themselves. Magic, therefore, is effective at encouraging empathy and understanding of perspectives and beliefs in televisual texts. Supernatural horror has often been understood in relation to trauma and grief. According to Becky Millar and Johnny Lee, it is particularly suited to represent these feelings because the disruption of the supernatural “mirror the core experience of disruption that accompanies bereavement” (171). Moreover, magic and the supernatural offer ways in which the experience of grief can “be contained and regulated and in doing so, may offer psychological benefits to the bereaved” (171). In the case of Yellowjackets, such connections are very much amplified by the ‘meta-experience’ facilitated by the show’s fan community. For some, these discussions on magic as reality or fiction are useful to help grieve the perceived loss of quality of the show across season two. Many expressed anger, sadness, dissolution, and disconnection with the show as a whole. Some took this as an opportunity to walk away claiming the “magic” of the show had been lost for them, and that they had “never seen such a dramatic drop in quality in a tv show … I think I’m done” (Reddit). One user turned to wishing for the occult and for magic, citing that “at this point, I'm quite content with this going full supernatural, since it could bring back Laura or Nat which would be impossible otherwise” (Reddit). Magic and supernatural are something that users, much like the characters of the show, have started to wish for as an escape from their experience. In a way, the discussions around the ambiguity of magic offers a sense of control. Sometimes audiences take pleasure in rationalising and making sense of a show for fun. In the case of Yellowjackets, though, we argue that audiences are using the uncertainty of magic to cope with a decline and navigate community and trauma. Some users explain that magic is not real as a way to demonstrate the show is still salvageable, others hope magic is real because that will make it salvageable. Much like the characters in Yellowjackets, some audience members are experiencing and working through a kind of ‘grief’ using the discussion of magic as a space to work through these ideas. 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