LGBT Memories of the Dictatorship: Recommended Documentaries, Podcasts, and Books
In Argentina's Memorial Month, a series of recommendations seek to delve deeper into the meaning of this holiday from the perspective of sexual diversity. Documentaries, books, and podcasts.
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March 24th marks the National Day of Remembrance for Truth and Justice in Argentina. Presentes offers a series of recommendations that seek to delve deeper into the meaning of this date from the perspective of sexual diversity. They are part of a fundamental archive for the country's history.
Forty-nine years after the genocidal coup that established the country's bloodiest civil-military dictatorship, a massive mobilization is expected this Monday. Human rights organizations will march united, after 19 years, to Plaza de Mayo, where the rally will take place at 4:30 p.m. "There are 30,000 of us. It was a genocide" is one of the strongest slogans, in response to the denial attempts of Javier Milei's government.
Last year, the Ministry of Defense dismantled the Armed Forces' Archive Survey and Analysis Teams. The national government also laid off dozens of employees at the National Secretariat of Human Rights and other facilities are being emptied. The "Virrey Cevallos" Memorial Space is one of the most affected, as are the Haroldo Conti Cultural Center and the National Archive of Memory.
The Argentine movement for Memory, Truth, and Justice is a global example and has successfully convicted more than a thousand people for crimes against humanity. There are numerous efforts by the Argentine people to keep the memory alive. We at Presentes share some of them.
DOCUMENTARIES
Where memory dwells
The documentary Donde habite la memoria condenses part of the lives of Julieta and Fabiana Gutiérrez, two trans survivors of the last civil-military dictatorship, illegally detained in the former Clandestine Center for Detention, Torture and Extermination (CCDTyE) “Pozo de Banfield” between 1976 and 1977. The audiovisual production is a thesis for the Bachelor of Communication Sciences at the University of Buenos Aires , directed by María Clara Olmos and Carolina Musso.
“So many of my companions are no longer here, those who were detained in this Pit. It was the Pit of Terror for us,” says Fabiana in a fragment of the short film. Around 440 people were held in the Banfield Pit, of whom 170 were murdered or disappeared. In March of last year, for the first time in Argentine history, military personnel were convicted of unlawful deprivation of liberty, torture, sexual abuse, and servitude of members of transvestite and trans communities. Julieta and Fabiana are among the survivors recognized by the State.
The faggots
The audiovisual production Los maricones was directed by Daniel Tortosa and released in 2016. It shows the testimonies of survivors of detentions in the Department of Information (D2) of Córdoba during the dictatorship and democracy, starting with the account of its director, but also those of Nadiha, Eugenio, Vanessa, Agostina, Marcia and Romina.
"As soon as we entered, they made us lie down and sit on a bench, and they bandaged us. That shocked me a lot because the bandage had been used. It was like sweat, it was damp, it was horrible," Tortosa describes at the beginning of the documentary.
BOOKS
Trans Memory Archive
There are three publications available from Editorial Archivo Trans. The first book—now reissued—was Archivo de la Memoria Trans . It bore the name of the institution that was presenting itself to society, and is like a cloud of memories, based on thematic axes.
The second book is If Your Mother Saw You , which highlights the vision of Claudia Pía Baudracco and the protagonists who documented her era, with brilliance and struggle.
The third, Our Codes , contains photos, stories and the construction of a unique language, edited by Liliana Viola.
Baths, parties and exiles
Bathrooms, Parties, and Exiles is a pioneering book exploring how state terrorism affected sexual diversity. For the first time, it revealed the everyday experiences of gay men in Buenos Aires during the last civil-military dictatorship. Written by Alejandro Modarelli and Flavio Rapisardi, it was published by Sudamericana in 2001. It was out of print for 20 years and was reissued by Biblioteca SOY in 2019.
“Those of us who went to the tea rooms all had a common game code. Gestures, short phrases, the layout of the spaces, and people who acted as 'bell men,' usually voyeurs. It was all silent, understood. No one who didn't want to participate in this game. And as soon as someone unfamiliar with the ritual entered, we stopped. The danger codes worked automatically. When the door opened, everyone stopped,” says one of the testimonies in the book.
The Nevermore of the crazy ones
The book "Never Again of the Mad Women. Resistance and Desire in the Last Dictatorship" was published by Marea Editorial as part of the Historia Urgente collection in 2023, marking four decades of democracy in Argentina. It tells the stories of kidnappings and disappearances suffered by the LGBT community during that period , and their ways of building memory and resistance.
“Forty years of democracy, with some rights achieved, give us the opportunity to begin to include our stories within the construction of history, to gain other subjectivities that allow us to live more freely,” journalist Matías Máximo , author of the book told Presentes .
Signed: Chronicles of clandestine loves
"Fichados" recovers silenced stories and reveals the cruelty and persecution of sexual diversity by the Buenos Aires police intelligence services. Its author, journalist Cristian Prieto, was assigned to safeguard the files of the Intelligence Division of the Buenos Aires Province Police (DIPBA), which operated between 1957 and 1998, during his work with the Provincial Commission for Memory . This is the thesis for his bachelor's degree in Social Communication from the National University of La Plata (UNLP), published by Editorial Pixel.
“We are called sexually amoral, pedophiles, homosexuals, effeminate, effeminate, transsexuals, and mannish women. Persecution, espionage, and surveillance were also verbs used to refer to crazy women throughout the entire period of intelligence's existence (1957–1998). Clearly, we were not the primary target of the last military dictatorship to be exterminated, but we were spied on from the beginning and end of the intelligence service's activity,” Prieto writes in the prologue.
Everything that power hates
Everything Power Hates Viviana Avendaño , a revolutionary militant, lesbian feminist, popular educator, and piquetero activist from Córdoba, raised and trained in the struggles of Villa El Libertador . She was also the youngest political prisoner in the province of Córdoba, shortly before the rise of state terrorism. She died on June 10, 2000, at the age of 41, along with her partner Laura Lucero, in a suspicious collision during a social conflict. She spent 5 years and 6 months in detention and was released on April 6, 1981. She also had a sister, Juana del Carmen Avendaño, who disappeared due to state terrorism.
Oliva gathered court and police documents, archival journalistic material, interviews with officials and people associated with the protagonist, and various personal sources to reconstruct the life and death of the picketer leader, who was also a Guevarist activist in the 1970s.
PODCAST
Tortilleras: A Lesbian Memoir
The first podcast from Agencia Presentes, Tortilleras: A Lesbian Memory , features five lesbian activists. 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.
Through a chorus of voices and archives from television and popular memory, hosted by Tati Español, Tortilleras addresses a genealogy of the lesbian struggle, ways of naming oneself, spaces for lesbian encounters and resistance, memories of raids, the final years of the dictatorship and the return of democracy, tensions and complicities with feminisms, and chosen families. It also questions the current situation, explains the networks being built today, and plays with imagining the future.
If you'd like to recommend other productions to add that aren't included in this article, leave your suggestion in the comments.
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