Esther Ortega Arjonilla
Esther Mayoko Ortega Arjonilla is a Spanish historian, doctor of philosophy in the philosophy of science, and a university professor of Ndowé origin. She is also an antiracist and lesbian feminist activist. Her research centers around themes of sexual diversity, racism, and feminism.
Biography
Esther Ortega earned her doctorate in the philosophy of science at the University of Santiago de Compostela. She earned her Master's degree in Feminist theory and is licensed in history, specializing in American anthropology and the History of the Americas, from Complutense University of Madrid. In her doctoral thesis, she focused on "the biomedical regulation of sexed bodies, gender practices and the socio-medical controversies associated with these regulations in the cases of trans identities in the Spanish state."Ortega has focused her research career on the studies of science, technology, and society, gender, race and ethnicity, queer-feminist theory and its intersections. She is a postgraduate professor of Science, Technology, and Society at the Spanish National Research Council at the Complutense University of Madrid and in the Spanish Tufts-Skidmore program. In addition, Ortega has been a lecturer and professor of different courses and lectures that address questions of race, sex, and sexuality, and she has written for Pikara Magazine.
Ortega has been a part of antiracist, feminist, and sexual diversity movements. In the 1990s, she was one of the cofounders of the university feminist collective "Insumisas al Género", and carried out her feminist activism on the Eskalera Karakola in Madrid, until her eviction in 2004. Ortega also belongs to the association formerly known as "Espacio Afroconciencia", linked to Matadero Madrid, along with Yeison García and Rubén H. Bermúdez, where she exercises her political activism. In addition, she is part of the feminist group "Red.Afrofem."
In 2003, Ortega began working on studies of gender and medical technologies from the perspective of gender studies and with many different national research projects, such as ITEMS, BIOGENTEC, and VIVERTEC. With these, she has worked on the research and development under the Spanish National Research Council's leading science, technology, and gender research with the philosopher Eulalia Pérez Sedeño, titled "Voces múltiples, saberes plurales y tecnologías médicas".
In 2023, Ortega participated in E. L. Queer. Primer Encuentro de Literatura Queer, which she celebrated in the Museo Nacional Centro de Arte Reina Sofía in Madrid.