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The voices of five lesbians with decades of activism star in the podcast Tortilleras: A Lesbian Memory , the first from Agencia Presentes. Produced by Luciana Leiras and Tati Español, it seeks to tell the story of the movement from 1980 onward in the City of Buenos Aires. It's about "listening to how we got here": who threw the first stone and who continued it. What was life like in times when the laws weren't on our side? What were their strategies? These were some of the many questions that prompted this series of episodes, packed with anecdotes, laughter, reflections, media archives, and data.

The protagonists of the four episodes of this first season are psychologist and feminist Ana Rubiolo; biologist and activist María Luisa Peralta; lesbian activist, former player, and current soccer director Mónica Santino, part of La Nuestra Futbol Feminista ; Adriana Carrasco, journalist and lesbian activist; and Lucrecia Rojas, lesbian activist and advocate for the recognition of caregiving tasks.

"The Tortilla Awakening," "A Gay Party," "Pride and Prejudice," and "All Together, All Lesbians" are the titles of the episodes in this first season, featuring stories and anecdotes from Buenos Aires. 

Through a chorus of voices and archives from television and popular memory, hosted by Tati Español, Tortilleras addresses a genealogy of the lesbian struggle, the ways in which lesbians name themselves, spaces for lesbian encounters and resistance, tensions and complicities with feminisms, and chosen families. It also questions the current situation, explaining the networks being built today and imagining the future. Each episode concludes with a glossary: ​​what were the Cuadernos de Existencia Lesbiana (Lesbian Existence Notebooks) , Potencia Tortillera (Tortillera Power ), who was Ilse Fuskova and Karina Urbina , among other details.

The podcast was launched on March 7, Lesbian Visibility Day, at the JJ Cultural Space, which was packed with the Tortillero Scandal festival. There was a public screening of the first episode, which deals with the awakening of the dyke. Luli and Tati shared how the initiative came about and thanked Agencia Presentes for the opportunity and the teamwork involved in its production. Ana Rubiolo, Mónica Santino, and María Luisa Peralta also participated. "There is an attempt to eliminate us in various ways—physically, economically, culturally, and symbolically—so it's very important to have these spaces," shared Peralta, who also acknowledged that Presentes' work uses them to support international denunciations of human rights violations.

The research was challenging. Along the way, Tati Español and Luli Leiras repeatedly encountered untraceable information, inaccessible books, and anecdotes that were difficult to reconstruct. They were guided by the imperative need to build a historical archive as a community. We spoke with them at Presentes —where Ana Fornaro and Maria Eugenia Ludueña coordinated the podcast.

How did this project come about?

Tati: We had traveled to the National LGBTIQNB+ Meeting in Rosario and met some older women from other provinces. They sparked our intrigue and curiosity about how other lesbians had experienced the years we weren't. Faced with the anguish of this government, I found myself with a very deep need to investigate how other lesbians had survived times of such oppression. Today, we don't experience the same things thanks to the activists we interviewed and many more.

Luli: We really wanted to do something to honor the voices of older lesbians. Tati and I talked a lot about the invisibility of lesbian history and our difficulty finding stories that reflect that. At that moment, Ilse (Fuskova) died, and we said: we have to do it. 

Why a lesbian memoir podcast?

Luli: We felt it was very important to tell the story through their own voices. Not only to learn about their experiences, but also to hear their way of speaking, with the passion they bring to each anecdote they tell us. This format is a plus. And we think it's essential that it remain an oral record.

Tati: It's a tool for us. I'm passionate about history because it explains things, it speaks to us about circularity, it can help us avoid the same mistakes. The idea is that this historical rescue be a tool of collective memory that preserves these stories . We felt it was essential that it be something simple, something that would reach everyone.

What place do archives and memory have in militancy?

Luli: It has the founding place, at least that's what we hope for. For a few years now, there's been a public lesbian movement that has to do with the possibility of inhabiting spaces or living everyday life in a way that has a lot to do with the steps taken through activism , with the rights we've fought for.

Tati: History, the archive, are essential for building ourselves into others. Today we can get married, walk down the street without being arrested, we can adopt. Archives and memory build meaning in our activism . They help us realize that we are much more than just two —as Sandra and Celeste (very present in the podcast) say when singing Mario Benedetti's poem—that someone started it and someone else continued.

What is the importance of this podcast in a context of attacks on diversity, and especially on lesbian identities?

Tati: I think it's very important to find ourselves, to know that lesbians have a network, that there are a lot of us, that we have ways of going through things that are different from perhaps other norms or identities. One way to counter all the hate speech is to make ourselves visible and show how others have lived, in order to reduce the level of myths surrounding lesbianism in society .

Luli: When we started thinking about this project, although attacks had already occurred—the Pepa Gaitán case, the fight for Higui's acquittal—it hadn't yet been so exacerbated. I think there's a resurgence of hate speech, both officially and in the media. That's what makes the attacks we've seen recently . That's where the content of this podcast is very important to us. We're talking about a time when there was not only a more repressive reality than we remembered, but also a curtailment of rights. That's why it's important to hear what the strategies and ways in which these lesbian lives were militarized. And it gives us a glimmer of hope .

What would you like to see happen with the podcast?

Luli: Let it be heard, let it reach a lot of people, especially people who don't know what they're going to find. Based on that, let them Google who Ana and Adriana are, what the Cuadernos de existencia lesbiana are, what María Luisa did, where Moni was active, the places Lucre mentions. Let it make them want to know a little more.

Tati: This is a start. We can't just highlight the ways the City of Buenos Aires is visible. We don't want it to be limited to that. The goal is to raise funds to make more seasons, so we can travel through the provinces, and find other lesbian stories. The intention is for each season to be based on a different province. Who knows, one day we might leave the country or make a documentary?

What things did you learn and enjoy doing it?

Luli: Many strategies, especially those of resistance and activism: setting up a lesbianism workshop at a Latin American and Caribbean Gathering in a garage. Or what Ana tells us, that being in a central location for feminism, they would meet in the kitchen, and from that place, they devised strategies for actions that ended up leading marches, planting a flag. And of course, the anecdotes about the enjoyment, the places they frequented—all of that was spectacular. 

Tati: I also learned that our history isn't so easily traceable. There are many inaccessible books, stories that are very difficult to reconstruct. Not to mention if you want to delve into earlier times: there's nothing. On the other hand, I was able to understand much better the friction and synergies that lesbians have with feminism . For many, feminism is the tool that gives them the opportunity to meet others, but at the same time, it's the activism that expels lesbians in those times. I also learned that we weren't just a few, but we were very isolated . And today we're closer together, working, thinking, meeting, and that's beautiful.

The first episode of the podcast is available on Spotify. Subsequent episodes will be published one per week. The script was directed, written, and produced by Tati Español and Luli Leiras for Agencia Presentes. Edited by Andy Cukier . Illustrations by Jules Mamones ( Feminutancia ). General coordination by María Eugenia Ludueña and Ana Fornaro.

The Tortilleras community: A Lesbian Memoir is on Instagram..