Sami | People, History, & Lifestyle (2024)

Sami, any member of a people speaking the Sami language and inhabiting Lapland and adjacent areas of northern Norway, Sweden, and Finland, as well as the Kola Peninsula of Russia. The three Sami languages, which are mutually unintelligible, are sometimes considered dialects of one language. They belong to the Finno-Ugric branch of the Uralic family. Almost all Sami are now bilingual, and many no longer even speak their native language. In the late 20th century there were from 30,000 to 40,000 Sami in Norway and about 20,000 in Sweden, 6,000 in Finland, and 2,000 in Russia.

The Sami are the descendants of nomadic peoples who had inhabited northern Scandinavia for thousands of years. When the Finns entered Finland, beginning about ad 100, Sami settlements were probably dispersed over the whole of that country; today they are confined to its northern extremity. In Sweden and Norway they have similarly been pushed north. The origin of the Sami is obscure; some scholars include them among the Paleo-Siberian peoples; others maintain that they were alpine and came from central Europe.

Reindeer herding was the basis of the Sami economy until very recently. Although the Sami hunted reindeer from the earliest times and kept them in small numbers as pack and decoy animals, full-scale nomadism with large herds began only a few centuries ago. The reindeer-herding Sami lived in tents or turf huts and migrated with their herds in units of five or six families, supplementing their diet along the way by hunting and fishing.

Nomadism, however, has virtually disappeared; the remaining herders now accompany their reindeer alone while their families reside in permanent modern housing. While the reindeer of a unit are herded communally, each animal is individually owned. Many Norwegian Sami are coastal fishermen, and those in other areas depend for their livelihoods on farming, forestry, freshwater fishing, and mining or on government, industrial, and commercial employment in cities and towns. Sami increasingly participate in the Scandinavian professional, cultural, and academic world.

The Skolt Sami of Finland (and perhaps also the Russian Sami) belong to the Russian Orthodox faith; most others are Lutheran. The shaman was important in non-Christian Sami society, and some shamanistic healing rites are still performed. There is, at least in most of the northern Sami communities, a strong evangelical congregationalism (Laestadianism), in which local congregations are virtually autonomous.

The Scandinavian countries periodically tried to assimilate the Sami, and the use of the Sami languages in schools and public life was long forbidden. In the second half of the 20th century, however, attention was drawn to the problems of the Sami minority, which became more assertive in efforts to maintain its traditional society and culture through the use of Sami in schools and the protection of reindeer pastures. In each country there are Sami political and cultural societies, and there are a few Sami newspapers and radio programs. See also Lapland.