Sami or
Saami is a general name for a group of
Uralic languagesThe Uralic languages constitute a language family of some three dozen languages spoken by approximately 25 million people. The healthiest Uralic languages in terms of the number of native speakers are Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian, Mari and Udmurt...
spoken by the
Sami peopleThe Sami people, also spelled Sámi, or Saami, are the arctic indigenous people inhabiting Sápmi, which today encompasses parts of far northern Sweden, Norway, Finland, the Kola Peninsula of Russia, and the border area between south and middle Sweden and Norway. The Sámi are Europe’s northernmost...
in parts of northern
FinlandFinland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
,
NorwayNorway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
,
SwedenSweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
and extreme northwestern
RussiaRussia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, in
Northern EuropeNorthern Europe is the northern part or region of Europe. Northern Europe typically refers to the seven countries in the northern part of the European subcontinent which includes Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Finland and Sweden...
. Sami is frequently and erroneously believed to be a single language. Several names are used for the Sami languages: Saami, Sámi, Saame, Samic, Saamic, as well as the exonyms Lappish and Lappic. The last two are, along with the term
Lapp, considered derogatory by many.
Classification
The Sami languages form a branch of the
Uralic language familyThe Uralic languages constitute a language family of some three dozen languages spoken by approximately 25 million people. The healthiest Uralic languages in terms of the number of native speakers are Hungarian, Finnish, Estonian, Mari and Udmurt...
. According to the traditional view, Sami is within the Uralic family most closely related to the
Finnic languagesThe term Finnic languages often means the Baltic-Finnic languages, an undisputed branch of the Uralic languages. However, it is also commonly used to mean the Finno-Permic languages, a hypothetical intermediate branch that includes Baltic Finnic, or the more disputed Finno-Volgaic languages....
(Sammallahti 1998). However, this view has recently been doubted by some scholars, who argue that the traditional view of a common Finno-Sami protolanguage is not as strongly supported as has been earlier assumed, and that the similarities may stem from an areal influence on Sami from Finnic.
In terms of internal relationships, the Sami languages are divided into two groups: western and eastern. The groups may be further divided into various subgroups and ultimately individual languages. (Sammallahti 1998: 6-38.) Parts of the Sami language area form a
dialect continuumA dialect continuum, or dialect area, was defined by Leonard Bloomfield as a range of dialects spoken across some geographical area that differ only slightly between neighboring areas, but as one travels in any direction, these differences accumulate such that speakers from opposite ends of the...
in which the neighbouring languages may be to a fair degree mutually intelligible, but two more widely separated groups will not understand each other's speech. There are, however, some sharp language boundaries, in particular between
Northern SamiNorthern or North Sami is the most widely spoken of all Sami languages. The speaking area of Northern Sami covers the northern parts of Norway, Sweden and Finland...
, Inari Sami and
Skolt SamiSkolt Sami is a Uralic, Sami language spoken by approximately 400 speakers in Finland, mainly in Sevettijärvi, and approximately 20–30 speakers of the Njuõˊttjäuˊrr dialect in an area surrounding Lake Lovozero in Russia. Skolt Sami used to also be spoken on the Neiden area of Norway,...
, the speakers of which are not able to understand each other without learning or long practice. The evolution of sharp language boundaries seems to suggest a relative isolation of the language speakers from each other and not very intensive contacts between the respective speakers in the past. There is some significance in this, as the geographical barriers between the respective speakers are no different than those in other parts of the Sami area.
Western Sami languages
- Southern Sami (600)
- Ume Sami (20)
- Pite Sami (20)
- Lule Sami (2000)
- Northern Sami (20,700)
Eastern Sami languages
- Inari Sami (300)
- Kemi Sami (extinct)
- Skolt Sami (420)
- Akkala Sami (extinct)
- Kildin Sami
Kildin Sami is a Sami language spoken by approximately 600 people on the Kola Peninsula in northwestern Russia...
(500)
- Ter Sami (2-10)
Note that the above figures are approximate.
Geographic distribution
The Sami languages are spoken in Sápmi in
Northern EuropeNorthern Europe is the northern part or region of Europe. Northern Europe typically refers to the seven countries in the northern part of the European subcontinent which includes Denmark, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Finland and Sweden...
, in a region stretching over the four countries
NorwayNorway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
,
SwedenSweden , officially the Kingdom of Sweden , is a Nordic country on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. Sweden borders with Norway and Finland and is connected to Denmark by a bridge-tunnel across the Öresund....
,
FinlandFinland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
and
RussiaRussia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, reaching from the southern part of central
ScandinaviaScandinavia is a cultural, historical and ethno-linguistic region in northern Europe that includes the three kingdoms of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, characterized by their common ethno-cultural heritage and language. Modern Norway and Sweden proper are situated on the Scandinavian Peninsula,...
in the southwest to the tip of the
Kola PeninsulaThe Kola Peninsula is a peninsula in the far northwest of Russia. Constituting the bulk of the territory of Murmansk Oblast, it lies almost completely to the north of the Arctic Circle and is washed by the Barents Sea in the north and the White Sea in the east and southeast...
in the east. The border between the languages does not follow the political borders.
During the
Middle AgesThe Middle Ages is a periodization of European history from the 5th century to the 15th century. The Middle Ages follows the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476 and precedes the Early Modern Era. It is the middle period of a three-period division of Western history: Classic, Medieval and Modern...
and Early Modern Age now extinct Sami languages were also spoken in the central and southern parts of
FinlandFinland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
and
KareliaKarelia , the land of the Karelian peoples, is an area in Northern Europe of historical significance for Finland, Russia, and Sweden...
and in a wider area on the Scandinavian peninsula. Historical documents as well as
FinnishFinnish is the language spoken by the majority of the population in Finland Primarily for use by restaurant menus and by ethnic Finns outside Finland. It is one of the two official languages of Finland and an official minority language in Sweden. In Sweden, both standard Finnish and Meänkieli, a...
and
KarelianKarelian refers to something from or related to the region of Karelia, in present-day Russia and FInland*Karelians*Karelian language*Karelian foods* Karelian pasties* Karelian hot pot* Karelian Birch, a cultivar of Betula pendula...
oral traditionOral tradition and oral lore is cultural material and traditions transmitted orally from one generation to another. The messages or testimony are verbally transmitted in speech or song and may take the form, for example, of folktales, sayings, ballads, songs, or chants...
contain many mentions of the earlier Sami inhabitation in these areas (Itkonen 1947). Also
loanwordA loanword is a word borrowed from a donor language and incorporated into a recipient language. By contrast, a calque or loan translation is a related concept where the meaning or idiom is borrowed rather than the lexical item itself. The word loanword is itself a calque of the German Lehnwort,...
s as well as place-names of Sami origin in the southern dialects of Finnish and Karelian dialects testify of earlier Sami presence in the area (Koponen 1996; Saarikivi 2004; Aikio 2007). These Sami languages, however, became later extinct under the wave of the Finno-Karelian agricultural expansion.
History
The Proto-Sami language is believed to have formed in the vicinity of the
Gulf of FinlandThe Gulf of Finland is the easternmost arm of the Baltic Sea. It extends between Finland and Estonia all the way to Saint Petersburg in Russia, where the river Neva drains into it. Other major cities around the gulf include Helsinki and Tallinn...
between 1000 B.C. to 700 A.D. derived from a common Proto-Sami-Finnic language (M. Korhonen 1981). However reconstruction of any basic proto-languages in the Uralic family have reached a level close to or identical to Proto-Uralic (Salminen 1999). The language is believed to have expanded west and north into
FennoscandiaFennoscandia and Fenno-Scandinavia are geographic and geological terms used to describe the Scandinavian Peninsula, the Kola Peninsula, Karelia and Finland...
during the
Iron AgeThe Iron Age is the archaeological period generally occurring after the Bronze Age, marked by the prevalent use of iron. The early period of the age is characterized by the widespread use of iron or steel. The adoption of such material coincided with other changes in society, including differing...
reaching central-
ScandinaviaScandinavia is a cultural, historical and ethno-linguistic region in northern Europe that includes the three kingdoms of Denmark, Norway and Sweden, characterized by their common ethno-cultural heritage and language. Modern Norway and Sweden proper are situated on the Scandinavian Peninsula,...
during the Proto-Scandinavian period (Bergsland 1996.). The language assimilated several layers of unknown Paleo-European languages from the early hunter gatherers, first during the Proto-Sami phase and second in the subsequent expansion of the language in the west and the north of Fennoscandia that is part of modern Sami today. (Aikio 2004, Aikio 2006).
Written languages and sociolinguistic situation
At present there are nine living Sami languages. The largest six of the languages have independent literary languages; the three others have no written standard, and of them, there are only few, mainly elderly speakers left. The
ISO 639-2ISO 639-2:1998, Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code, is the second part of the ISO 639 standard, which lists codes for the representation of the names of languages. The three-letter codes given for each language in this part of the standard are referred to as...
code for all Sami languages without its proper code is "smi". The six written languages are:
- Northern Sami (Norway, Sweden, Finland): With an estimated 15,000 speakers, this accounts for probably more than 75% of all Sami speakers in 2002. ISO 639-1
ISO 639-1:2002, Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 1: Alpha-2 code, is the first part of the ISO 639 series of international standards for language codes. Part 1 covers the registration of two-letter codes. There are 136 two-letter codes registered...
/ISO 639-2ISO 639-2:1998, Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code, is the second part of the ISO 639 standard, which lists codes for the representation of the names of languages. The three-letter codes given for each language in this part of the standard are referred to as...
: se/sme
- Lule Sami (Norway, Sweden): The second largest group with an estimated 1,500 speakers. ISO 639-2
ISO 639-2:1998, Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code, is the second part of the ISO 639 standard, which lists codes for the representation of the names of languages. The three-letter codes given for each language in this part of the standard are referred to as...
: smj
- Southern Sami (Norway, Sweden): 500 speakers (estimated). ISO 639-2
ISO 639-2:1998, Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code, is the second part of the ISO 639 standard, which lists codes for the representation of the names of languages. The three-letter codes given for each language in this part of the standard are referred to as...
: sma
- Inari Sami (Enare Sami) (Inari
Inari is Finland's largest, sparsely populated municipality with four official languages, more than any other in the country. Its major sources of income are lumber industry and nature maintenance. With the museum Siida in the village of Inari, it is a center of Sami culture...
, Finland): 500 speakers (estimated). SIL code: LPI, ISO 639-2ISO 639-2:1998, Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code, is the second part of the ISO 639 standard, which lists codes for the representation of the names of languages. The three-letter codes given for each language in this part of the standard are referred to as...
: smn
- Skolt Sami (Näätämö and the Nellim-Keväjärvi districts, Inari
Inari is Finland's largest, sparsely populated municipality with four official languages, more than any other in the country. Its major sources of income are lumber industry and nature maintenance. With the museum Siida in the village of Inari, it is a center of Sami culture...
municipality, Finland, also spoken in RussiaRussia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
, previously in Norway): 400 speakers (estimated). SIL code: LPK, ISO 639-2ISO 639-2:1998, Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code, is the second part of the ISO 639 standard, which lists codes for the representation of the names of languages. The three-letter codes given for each language in this part of the standard are referred to as...
: sms
- Kildin Sami
Kildin Sami is a Sami language spoken by approximately 600 people on the Kola Peninsula in northwestern Russia...
(Kola PeninsulaThe Kola Peninsula is a peninsula in the far northwest of Russia. Constituting the bulk of the territory of Murmansk Oblast, it lies almost completely to the north of the Arctic Circle and is washed by the Barents Sea in the north and the White Sea in the east and southeast...
, Russia): 608 speakers in Murmansk OblastMurmansk Oblast is a federal subject of Russia , located in the northwestern part of Russia. Its administrative center is the city of Murmansk.-Geography:...
, 179 in other Russian regions. Although 1991 persons stated their Saami ethnicity (1769 of them live in Murmansk OblastMurmansk Oblast is a federal subject of Russia , located in the northwestern part of Russia. Its administrative center is the city of Murmansk.-Geography:...
) SIL code: LPD
The other Sami languages are critically endangered or moribund and have very few speakers left. Pite Sami has about 30–50 speakers, and a dictionary and an official orthography is under way. Ume Sami likely has under 20 speakers left, and ten speakers of Ter Sami were known to be alive in 2004. The last speaker of Akkala Sami is known to have died in December 2003, and the eleventh attested variety, Kemi Sami, became extinct in the 19th century.
Orthographies
The Sami languages use an extended version of the
Latin alphabetThe Latin alphabet, also called the Roman alphabet, is the most recognized alphabet used in the world today. It evolved from a western variety of the Greek alphabet called the Cumaean alphabet, which was adopted and modified by the Etruscans who ruled early Rome...
.
| Northern Sami: |
Áá Čč Đđ Ŋŋ Šš Ŧŧ Žž |
| Inari Sami: |
Áá Ââ Ää Čč Đđ Šš Žž |
| Skolt Sami: |
(+soft signThe soft sign , also known as yer, is a letter of the Cyrillic script. In Old Church Slavonic, it represented a short front vowel. As with its companion, the back yer, the vowel phoneme it designated was later partly dropped and partly merged with other vowels...
) |
| Lule Sami in Sweden: |
Áá Åå Ńń Ää |
| Lule Sami in Norway: |
Áá Åå Ńń Ææ |
| Southern Sami in Sweden: |
Ïï Ää Öö Åå |
| Southern Sami in Norway: |
Ïï Ææ Øø Åå |
Note that the letter is a capital
D with a barĐ , formed from D with the addition of a bar or stroke through the letter. This is the same modification that was used to create eth , but eth is based on an insular variant of d while đ is based on its usual upright shape...
across it (
UnicodeUnicode is a computing industry standard for the consistent encoding, representation and handling of text expressed in most of the world's writing systems...
U+0110) also used in
SerbianSerbian is a form of Serbo-Croatian, a South Slavic language, spoken by Serbs in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Croatia and neighbouring countries....
etc, and is not the capital
ethEth is a letter used in Old English, Icelandic, Faroese , and Elfdalian. It was also used in Scandinavia during the Middle Ages, but was subsequently replaced with dh and later d. The capital eth resembles a D with a line through the vertical stroke...
(Ð; U+00D0) found in
IcelandicIcelandic is a North Germanic language, the main language of Iceland. Its closest relative is Faroese.Icelandic is an Indo-European language belonging to the North Germanic or Nordic branch of the Germanic languages. Historically, it was the westernmost of the Indo-European languages prior to the...
,
FaroeseFaroese , is an Insular Nordic language spoken by 48,000 people in the Faroe Islands and about 25,000 Faroese people in Denmark and elsewhere...
or
Old EnglishOld English or Anglo-Saxon is an early form of the English language that was spoken and written by the Anglo-Saxons and their descendants in parts of what are now England and southeastern Scotland between at least the mid-5th century and the mid-12th century...
, which it is almost identical to.
Note also that the different characters used on the different sides of the Swedish/Norwegian border merely are orthographic standards based on the
SwedishModern Swedish is written with a 29-letter Latin alphabet:Prior to the 13th edition of Svenska Akademiens ordlista in 2006, the letters and were collated together....
and Norwegian alphabet, respectively, and don't denote different pronunciations.
Kildin Sami now uses an extended version of the
Cyrillic alphabetThe Cyrillic script or azbuka is an alphabetic writing system developed in the First Bulgarian Empire during the 10th century AD at the Preslav Literary School...
(in three slightly different variants): аА бБ вВ гГ дД еЕ ёЁ жЖ зЗ / иИ йЙ / кК лЛ мМ нН оО пП рР сС тТ уУ фФ хХ цЦ чЧ шШ (щЩ) ъЬ ыЫ ьЬ эЭ юЮ яЯ
Skolt Sami uses ˊ (U+02CA) as a soft sign; due to technical restrictions, it is often replaced by ´ (U+00B4).
Norway
Adopted in April 1988, Article 110a of the Norwegian Constitution states: "It is the responsibility of the authorities of the State to create conditions enabling the Sami people to preserve and develop its language, culture and way of life". The Sami Language Act went into effect in the 1990s. Sami is an official language of the municipalities of
Kautokeinoor Guovdageaidnu , is a municipality in Finnmark county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Guovdageaidnu/Kautokeino...
,
KarasjokKárášjohka or is a village and municipality in Finnmark county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Karasjok.-Name:Karasjok is a Norwegianized form of the Sámi name Kárášjohka...
, Gáivuotna (Kåfjord),
NessebyUnjárga or Nesseby is a municipality in Finnmark county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Varangerbotn....
,
PorsangerPorsanger or Porsáŋgu or Porsanki is a municipality in Finnmark county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Lakselv...
, Tana,
TysfjordTysfjord or Divtasvuodna is a municipality in Nordland county, Norway. It is part of the Ofoten traditional region. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Kjøpsvik...
,
LavangenLavangen is a municipality in Troms county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Tennevoll. The municipality is situated around the area of the river Spansdalelva og Lavangen fjord...
and
SnåsaSnåsa is a municipality in Nord-Trøndelag county, Norway. It is part of the Innherred region. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Snåsa. Other villages include Agle and Jørstad....
.
Finland
In
FinlandFinland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...
, the Sami language act of 1991 granted Sami people the right to use the Sami languages for all government services. Three Sami languages are recognized: Northern, Skolt and Inari Sami. The Sami language act of 2003 made Sami an official language in
EnontekiöEnontekiö is a municipality in the Finnish part of Lapland with approx. inhabitants. It is situated in the outermost northwest of the country and occupies a large and very sparsely populated area of about between the Swedish and Norwegian border...
,
InariInari is Finland's largest, sparsely populated municipality with four official languages, more than any other in the country. Its major sources of income are lumber industry and nature maintenance. With the museum Siida in the village of Inari, it is a center of Sami culture...
,
Sodankylä-Twin towns: Kola, Russia, since 1968 Berlevåg, Norway, since 1971 Norsjö, Sweden, since 1977 Heiligenblut, Austria, since 1979-External links:* – Official website* * * * * *...
and
UtsjokiUtsjoki is a municipality in Finland. It is located in Lapland and borders Norway as well as the municipality of Inari. The municipality was founded in 1876. It has a population of and covers an area of ofwhich is water. The population density is....
municipalities.
Sweden
On 1 April 2002, Sami became one of five recognized minority languages in Sweden. It can be used in dealing with public authorities in the
municipalitiesThe municipalities of Sweden are the local government entities of Sweden. The current 290 municipalities are organized into 21 counties...
of
ArjeplogArjeplog Municipality is a municipality in Norrbotten County in northern Sweden. Its seat is located in Arjeplog....
,
GällivareGällivare Municipality is a municipality in Norrbotten County in northern Sweden. Its seat is located in Gällivare.The municipality is the third largest in Sweden, but it has not been amalgamated with other entities....
,
JokkmokkJokkmokk Municipality is a municipality in Norrbotten County in northern Sweden. Its seat is located in Jokkmokk.The name Jokkmokk is Sami for the words "river" and "bend", since the town is situated close to a bend in the nearby river....
and
KirunaKiruna Municipality is a municipality in Norrbotten County in northernmost Sweden. Its seat is located in Kiruna...
. In 2011 this list was enlarged considerably.
External links