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Moira Millán lives in the future. The Mapuche is prepared for the hecatombs foretold by dystopias and for the more real environmental collapse. Her latest book, Terricidio, ancestral wisdom for an alternative world , brings together essays that intertwine indigenous identity with themes that defy time: diversity, territory, body, technology, motherhood, childhood, resistance. It was published in Argentina in September by Penguin Random House, the largest publishing group of books in Spanish, and its echo is spreading worldwide. Terricidio is a global cry and denunciation. Weeks ago, Moira was in France presenting Terricide (Des Femmes Antoinette Fouque). It is soon to be released in Colombia, Mexico, and Italy. It will be presented in Brazil in October. It will be released soon in the United Kingdom, and there are interested publishers in the United States and Japan.

Terricidio disseminates the concepts and political practices of those who inhabit the territories. And those who inhabit the territories are not just individuals. It includes many expressions of Mapudungun , and like this Mapuche language, it is permeated by vitality and diversity.

We chatted over Zoom one winter day; she was passing through Esquel, plotting upcoming collective actions. Moira lives 100 kilometers away, in the Lof Pillañ Mahuiza, a recovered—and now threatened—territory, in a small bio-house surrounded by forests, on the banks of the Carrenleufú River (Chubut). In that Patagonian paradise, her community, along with other Mapuche Lofs, suffered a violent raid and the arbitrary detention of Victoria Núñez Fernández . The judiciary, the provincial and national governments, accused the Lof of being terrorists and Moira of leading that gang , through a campaign of false information.

The thermometer read 15 degrees below zero the afternoon we spoke.

I was just talking to one of my daughters about how, if a global collapse were to happen, I think we'd know how to survive. Everything is frozen, there's no water in the houses, and many people are without heating due to the extremely low temperatures. And in the countryside, we have the river. Yes, we carry buckets because the pipes are frozen. But everything runs on firewood; it's manageable. We don't need a company to deliver our heating. There's a lot of autonomy.

Autonomy is a word that runs through Terricidio , through what Moira says and does. She is, among many things, a great communicator. Perhaps this talent is another expression of her weychafe . Years ago, she explained this to journalists when we asked how to introduce her. She doesn't like being confused with a leader or a chief. "I was born with the newen, the spirit of a defender of life, a guardian of the Mapu (land). Weychafe comes from weychan, which means to fight. Some translate it as warrior, but in reality, that's not the case. The Mapuche nation is not expansionist or warlike; it defends itself. Weychan is the legitimate process of self-defense ," she recapitulates in Terricidio.

Reading her is the closest thing to talking to her live and in person, in a tangible and intangible time.

-In your words: Who is Moira Millán?

I am a Mapuche woman living in recovered territory. Having recovered territory, living in the countryside, shapes me differently. In times when neo-fascism, the terricidal government, stalks and harasses us, my life has become very difficult, constantly on alert, keeping the right to territory under threat. I am an activist defending the rights of my people and of Indigenous women. I have been an ideologue and founder of a multitude of spaces. It seems I can't conceive of life without being collectively interwoven among my peers.

Moira promoted the Movement of Indigenous Women and Diversities for Good Living, which organized various collective interventions, including a peaceful sit-in at the Ministry of the Interior in 2019 : "Help us break the media siege: there is no social pact if politics is land murder," they demanded. Hundreds of Indigenous women held talks about bullying and abuses against children, women, and diversity. Today, she organizes the Pluriversidad (Pluriversity) program, seeking a pedagogy of ancestral wisdom and knowledge useful for good living.

I've been moving among the Mapuche communities of Puel Mapu, also connecting with Gulu Mapu in Chile. My childhood was under a dictatorship, my adolescence under a democracy. But democracy never came to Indigenous peoples. I'm a mother of four children, raised them alone, and I'm a grandmother with three granddaughters.

-How does your writing come into play?

I write not because I'm a writer, but because I want to tell stories. There's a lot of Indigenous literature in other countries, but it's scarce in Argentina. That's why I started writing. I also work in film, writing scripts. I have to write a television series, commissions that come in from abroad. I'm not called in Argentina.

-What would you like to read?

I have different concerns. And I have a lot of questions about children's literature. I'm the grandmother who, instead of buying toys for my granddaughters, gives them books. Going into a bookstore and choosing is the worst moment; I always leave frustrated. I can't find the kind of literature I want to offer my granddaughters in children's bookstores . I'm thinking about writing for children. I'd like a more diverse, identity-based children's literature that reflects Indigenous worlds and worldviews. There are so many stories, but what's circulating has nothing to do with the oral memory of my people or other Indigenous peoples. I'd like to know more about those who helped Indigenous peoples survive genocide and emerge from that darkness. There's a lack of stories, protagonists, and, fundamentally, Indigenous women.

(From Agencia Presentes, we developed a series of comics , illustrated by Florencia Capella, to tell the lives of some of these survivors.)

-Poetry, although it's a minority, exists quite a bit. But I'd like to read political essays and history from an Indigenous perspective. There are many literary genres that require transversality and an Indigenous perspective .

Terricidio falls into that category of political essay. In the prologue, anthropologist Arturo Escobar (Colombia) positions the author as “a thinker of the living cosmos” and the book as a cosmobiography, “a biography written from the perspective of how cosmogonic forces constitute the Mapuche people, their territory, and Moira Millán .”

She coined the word Terricidio, a relative of Ecocide and Travesticide, to summarize the ways in which life is destroyed. “A continuous assault on the cosmic order. Without justice, people will never have peace.” She proposes recovering the ancestral, three-dimensional view of life and the beings that come together in that order. It's not just about animals, plants, water, and air. “Nature is not only made up of tangible elements,” Moira explains. She leaves us wondering: “How could we as humanity accept the extermination of groups of people and communities based on their social, racial, ideological, or religious background? Environmentalists, indigenous peoples, women, LGBTIQ movements?”

-Is there a founding image that triggered the concept of Terricidio?

Yes. I remember being in a Mbya Guaraní community and seeing one of the children holding a toucan. Behind them, an electrified fence impounded the stream where he used to play. The look on that child's face, making sure the bird didn't touch that wire, was decisive. What kind of world are we leaving them? Several children in that community had been injured after going to the stream. How is it possible that the lives of these children are worthless? Voracious capitalism is draining the territories. It also prompted me to think about the word territory; it wasn't just the annihilation of these companies' impact on the life of tangible ecosystems, but on the life of the people. 

-What surprises does the book hold for you in other contexts and cultures?

I've been surprised that Terricidio is quickly doing so well. It's not that El tren del olvido (his first book, a novel) has done poorly (it was translated into English, will be published in France in 2026, and is about to be made into a film). I'm surprised that it's being compared to the geopolitical and ecological essays, sometimes very technical, that emerge from academic circles. It's become quite a popular book. I receive letters from everyone from teenagers to people deeply interested in alternative literature. I like that it's a direct, honest, and authentic conversation with the recipient. And the recipient doesn't have an age, a cultural, or a social background; it's all Earthlings. I think that's being perceived in the way it's reaching many sectors. The presentations in France were an indicator of that heterogeneity.

-In your head, are you still writing this book? Are you thinking about what you'd add to it?

-Yes, I would add more proactive issues. The category of telluric peoples is deeply embedded in the prefiguration of the new alternative world. I'm excited to think about what it would be like to organize based on that identity. I have everything in my head (laughs). It would be arrogant to generate tips on how to make the transition from this anthropocentric, materialist, Europeanist, supremacist, racist society to the good life. I don't have the answers; it's something that will be navigated collectively .

"The Mapuche issue remains marginal to the human rights agenda."

-In Terricidio, you say that the Mapuche people are receiving the strength to protect their territory and the planet. You also say that fascism has a global consensus. You were accused of being a terrorist, Victoria Núñez Fernández was imprisoned, and you suffered violent raids. How do you experience this duality and this hostile environment?

-Outraged by so much impunity. My two daughters, Llanca and Rain, are being prosecuted by those who tried to imprison me. Prosecutor María Bottini is accusing them because, on the last anniversary of Ni Una Menos, Bottini gave a talk on preventing gender violence. It was a contradiction; she was one of those who carried out the raid on our community, which involved mistreatment and violence against women and the elderly, culminating in Victoria's arrest. My daughters, along with other Mapuche sisters, confronted her, telling her what we experienced. And she ended up reporting them. 

We live seeking spiritual strength. We go to the river, we make offerings, we ask for strength, for it to cleanse our minds, our hearts, our spirits; for wisdom to walk in the territories, to live life, for protection. And we also live on alert. Drones, helicopters, and unlicensed trucks continue to prowl, entering at dawn. They want to evict us. All to protect the Carrenleufú River from this aqueduct project, with the presence of Israeli forces in our territory. We see what's happening in Palestine. What compassion will these people have in our territory? And I don't know what level of solidarity the Argentine people will have. Since the raids, no human rights organization in Argentina, except for the Permanent Assembly for Human Rights of Esquel, has come to our territory. 

-What explanation do you find?

On the one hand, human rights organizations are overwhelmed by what the government is causing. On the other, the Mapuche issue remains marginal on the human rights agenda . And there are the dominant narratives, which lie, portraying us as terrorists or savages. We'll have to unravel those colonial narratives and recover those of the people. But it's difficult; there's censorship. I was invited to Radio Nacional Esquel on March 8, but the interview couldn't be conducted. The journalist who took me was mistreated. Even if the government changes, I won't set foot on Radio Nacional Esquel. Racism and complicity are fueled by the impunity of a hateful government. It's very difficult to talk about terricide in Argentina when there's censorship surrounding what's happening to us.

Educate and transition towards good living

-In the ideal world, how do you imagine the good life?

– Despite the harassment and repression by the Argentine state, I believe that the Mapuche people in their recovered territory are building a good life. In this autonomy, we gain strength and freedom. With the land and from the land, it is possible to create this good life. We must transition toward good living. Megacities will have to transform; they can no longer be inhabited this way. But the education system does not prepare them for good living.

Moira exemplifies this with the siblings who survived a 40-day plane crash in the Colombian Amazon. “They managed to survive because a grandmother taught them how to collect water, what fruits to eat, how to build a shelter in the jungle. She gave them essential knowledge for the development of life and spirituality. We have to think about what tools we are going to give children and adolescents while we are talking about a possible nuclear war, an unprecedented environmental collapse. We must educate for good living .”

Women are makers of new worlds

-Do you know of any experiences toward these horizons of hope from the telluric communities?

Fortunately, yes. I always seek out these experiences; wherever they tell me, I go and see. There are the liberators of Mother Earth in Cauca (Colombia), the Nasa people organizing and protecting themselves with other peasant sectors. They reclaim land, sugarcane fields for biofuels, they eliminate monocultures, and they plant food. At harvest time, they fill their trucks with vegetables and go to the poorest areas of the cities, like Cali or Medellín. They bring the fruit of the Earth, distribute food in soup kitchens during sociocultural events, not in the style of opportunistic populist governments. They generate this exchange in spaces for debate, reflection, and workshops. There are encounters, there are words, there is music. And from there, they offer an offering to the food that has been grown, freeing the land from agrochemicals. That exchange has a different flavor. 

Moira shares several experiences. She speaks of the Purépecha people of Cherán, “who declared self-determination, driving out drug traffickers and the Mexican state, and defining how to generate security and an economy.” There's the Zapatista movement. And the one she met in California. “I liked this alliance of different peoples. Bioculture is in fashion, but there I saw biocultural plurinationality, a plurinational agroecological experience . There are a lot of young people. And women are there, bringing drive, strength, and joy. They are the creators of new worlds .”

This interview was originally published on Hecho en Buenos Aires through our media partnership.