The Sámi World

This book provides a comprehensive and multifaceted analysis of the Sámi society and its histories and people, offering valuable insights into how they live and see the world. The chapters examine a variety of social and cultural practices, and consideration is given to environment, legal and political conditions and power relations. The contributions by a range of experts of Sámi studies and Indigenous scholars are drawn from across the Sápmi region, which spans from central Norway and central Sweden across Finnish Lapland to the Kola Peninsula in Russia. Sámi perspectives, concepts and ways of knowing are foregrounded throughout the volume. The material connects with wider discussions within Indigenous studies and engages with current concerns relating to globalization, environmental and cultural change, Arctic politics, multiculturalism, postcolonialism and neoliberalism. The Sámi World will be of interest to scholars from a number of disciplines, including Indigenous studies, anthropology, sociology, geography, history and political science. Cover 1 Half Title 2 Series 3 Title 4 Copyright 5 Contents 6 List of figures 10 List of tables 12 List of maps 13 List of contributors 14 Introduction: Introduction to the Sámi world 22 Part I Guođohit – Living with/in Nature 40 1 A window into vanishing Sámi culture? Visual representations of Sáminess in the shared Siida exhibition by Sámi Museum Siida and Northern Lapland’s Nature Centre 42 2 Gákti on the pulse of time: The double perspective of the traditional Sámi dress 60 3 Skolt Saami Leu'dd: Tradition as a medium of individual and collective remembrance 74 4 Trickster blurring expectations and values of Sámi community: Author Jovnna-Ánde Vest reshaping Sámi muittašangirjjálašvuohta (reminiscence literature) 93 5 The river breaks – and freezes: Sámi women in Laestadianism 107 6 From History to Herstory of the Sámi world: Proposing a feminist approach to the settlement history of Finnish Lapland 121 7 Caught in the state’s net? Ecologies of care in Deanuleahki, Sápmi 136 8 Defining the Sámi cultural environment: New perspectives for fieldwork 155 9 Frustrated caretakers: Sámi egg gatherers and cloudberry pickers 171 10 Sámi food culture: Traditional practices and contemporary challenges 186 11 Understanding Sámi reindeer herders’ knowledge systems of snow and ice 202 12 Issues of Sámi representation in Finnish tourism: A quest for authenticity 218 Part II Gierdat – Living through/in Societal Ruptures 236 13 The futures of Sami languages 238 14 Residential schooling of the Sámi in the Soviet Union: Historical development and impacts 253 15 The Sámi in the spiral of negative social developments of the Soviet North 269 16 Changing states, changing Sámi? Framing the state and the Sámi in studies of history in Finland and Norway 1923–1954 284 17 The Sámi flag(s): From a revolutionary sign to an institutional symbol 297 18 Who are ‘We, the People’? A comparative analysis of the right to register in the Sámi electoral roll in Finland, Norway and Sweden 315 19 Toxic speech, political self-Indigenization and the ethics and politics of critique: Notes from Finland 331 20 The history and current situation of discrimination against the Sámi 349 21 Municipal politics in the Sámi homeland in Finland 369 22 The Stockholm Sámi administrative area and Indigenous resurgence 385 23 The role of the Sámi media in democratic processes: The Arctic Railway in Yle Sápmi and NRK Sápmi 403 24 The Áltá and Deatnu conflicts and the articulations of nature 418 Part III Duostat – Envisioning Sámi Futures 434 25 The history of the hybrid Sámi media system 436 26 ‘It should be her language’: New speakers of Sámi languages transmitting the language to the next generation 451 27 Ládjogahpir rematriated: Decolonization of the Sámi women’s hat of pride 467 28 Sámi research ethics under construction 486 29 Driving around with Aunt Máret: Historical consciousness of the Sámi in transition 500 30 The characteristics and legal status of Sámi legal tradition and law 515 31 Commemorating continuity: Reconciling material representations in Sääʹm land 528 32 Sámi storytelling through design 541 33 Sámi feminist conversations 556 34 Queer Indigenous world-making in the Sámi TV comedy Njuoska bittut 572 35 The activism of having fun: Young Sámi in urban areas of Norway and Sweden 586 Epilogue: Ways of being in the world 600 Index 612 Skolt,Saami,Leuʹdd;,Sámi,muittašangirjjálašvuohta;,cloudberry,pickers Skolt Saami Leuʹdd,Sámi muittašangirjjálašvuohta,cloudberry pickers Over the past decades, online hate speech against the Indigenous Sámi people has sharply proliferated, and in each Nordic country, it is now considered a problem requiring counter-measures and further study. This chapter employs Lynne Tirrell's notion of toxic speech to examine anti-Sámi hate speech that is specific to the political terrain in Finland. There, such speech is particularly common in debates which centre on criticism of the Sámi Parliament, voiced mainly by popular movements which promote political self-Indigenization to gain access in the Sámi Parliament's electoral register. Although these movements make explicit use of academic knowledge production and discourses which highlight Sámi cultural revitalization and recovery, the study shows how, on the level of popular rhetoric and in the social media, the same discourses are operationalized to purposefully undermine Sámi peoplehood and rights, to denigrate any individual or institution which is seen to defend such rights, and to disseminate pejorative representations of the Sámi. The chapter ends with a short exploration of possible reasons which explain why this form of toxic speech has so far been particularly impervious to criticism and public exposure "This book provides a comprehensive and multifaceted analysis of the Sámi society and its histories and people, offering valuable insights into how they live and see the world. The chapters examine a variety of social and cultural practices and consideration is given to environment, legal and political conditions and power relations. The contributions by a range of Sámi specialists and Indigenous scholars are drawn from across the Sápmi region, which spans from central Norway and central Sweden across Finnish Lapland to the Kola Peninsula in Russia. Sámi perspectives, concepts and ways of knowing are foregrounded throughout the volume. The material connects with wider discussions within Indigenous studies and engages with current concerns relating to globalization, environmental and cultural change, Arctic politics, multiculturalism, postcolonialism and neoliberalism. The Sámi World will be of interest to scholars from a number of disciplines, including Indigenous studies, anthropology, sociology, geography, history and political science"-- Provided by publisher