Editor’s note: Washington Blade International News Editor Michael K. Lavers was on assignment in Argentina and Uruguay from April 2-12, 2025.
ROSARIO, Argentina — Two transgender women in Argentina’s Santa Fe province are documenting the persecution of trans people that took place during the brutal military dictatorship that governed their country from 1976-1983.
Carolina Boetti and Marzia Echenique created the Travestí Trans Santa Fe Archive, which seeks to “create a collective memory,” in 2020. (“Travestí” is the Spanish word for “crossdresser.”)
The archive, among other things, includes interviews with trans women who the dictatorship arrested and tortured. The archive also contains photographs from that period.
The archive is not in a specific location, but Boetti and Echenique hav