The Sami and the Church of Sweden
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T D ANIEL his book presents results from a white paper project on the historical HE relations between the established Evangelical Lutheran Church of Swe- S AMI AND AND AMI den and the indigenous Sami people. The research project, which was L INDMARK & Tlaunched in November 2012 and concluded in February 2017, was funded by the Church of Sweden Research Department and hosted by Umeå University. It was THE SAMI AND set up following an explicit request by representatives of the Sami community made at a hearing in 2011. Documentation of the abuse inflicted by the Church T O HE CHURCH OF OF CHURCH HE LLE SUND THE CHURCH OF SWEDEN throughout history was regarded as a precondition for a continued reconcilia- tion process. In April 2016, a comprehensive academic report was published. The contents Results from a White Paper Project of this two-volume book consisting of 33 articles written by experts in the field ST were summarised and discussed in a popular science publication issued in Feb- RÖM (ED ruary 2017. Chapters on reconciliation as concept and practice were included in this abridged version so as to make it useful in reconciliation activities in church Daniel Lindmark & Olle Sundström (eds.) S S WEDEN and Sami communities. .) The current book, The Sami and the Church of Sweden: Re- sults from a White Paper Project, is a translation of the popular science publication, supplemented with a more detailed intro- duction and two updating and concluding chapters. Through this English version, international readers can inform them- selves about the background, assignment, organisation, results and reception of a research project carried out within a recon- ciliation process. The editors Daniel Lindmark and Olle Sundström were in- volved in the management of the White Paper Project. They work at Umeå University, Lindmark as a professor of church history, and Sundström as an associate professor of history of religions. ISBN 978 91 7844 397 0 ISBN 978-917844397-0 9 789178 443970 Gidlunds förlag Gidlunds förlag The Sami and the Church of Sweden The Sami and the Church of Sweden RESULTS FROM A WHITE PAPER PROJECT Daniel Lindmark & Olle Sundström (eds.) Gidlunds förlag Gidlunds förlag Örlinge 111, se-733 99 Möklinta, Sweden [email protected], www.gidlunds.se Cover: “Vinden” (‘The Wind’), embroidery, © Britta Marakatt-Labba / Bild- upphovsrätt 2018, photo: Hans-Olof Utsi. Religion i Norrland 4 © The authors and the editors, 2018 isbn 978 91 7844 397 0 Printed by Bulls Graphics, Halmstad 2018 CONTENTS Acknowledgements ...................................................................... 7 1. The Church of Sweden and the Sami — a White Paper Project ......................................................9 DANIEL LINDMARK & OLLE SUNDSTRÖM PART I. A SUMMARY OF THE SCHOLARLY ANTHOLOGY 2. The Scholarly Anthology and White Papers as a Contemporary Phenomenon ...................................... 23 BJÖRN NORLIN & DAVID SJÖGREN 3. The Church, Mission and School ....................................... 29 BJÖRN NORLIN 4. The Church and Sami Cultural Expressions ..................... 45 BJÖRN NORLIN 5. The Sami and the Church as an Authority........................ 59 DAVID SJÖGREN 6. The Church and Sami People Outside the Church of Sweden .......................................... 77 DAVID SJÖGREN 7. Final Reflections .................................................................. 85 BJÖRN NORLIN & DAVID SJÖGREN PART II. PERSPECTIVES ON RECONCILIATION 8. Acknowledged History and Renewed Relationships ...... 97 TORE JOHNSEN 9. The Barrier Torn Down ......................................................125 CARL REINHOLD BRÅKENHIELM 10. Ways Forward ..................................................................... 149 SYLVIA SPARROCK PART III. CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS 11. The Reception of the White Paper Project and Its Publications ............................................................ 181 DANIEL LINDMARK & OLLE SUNDSTRÖM 12. The Overall Results of the White Paper Project ............. 205 DANIEL LINDMARK & OLLE SUNDSTRÖM Notes ...........................................................................................214 References ...................................................................................237 Authors and Editors ..................................................................253 Acknowledgements This book presents results from a white paper project on the histor- ical relations between the Church of Sweden and the Sami people. Starting in November 2012, the project was concluded in February 2017 when the final report was released, on which the current book is based. In addition to the original nine chapters, the English ver- sion contains a concluding section comprising two new chapters. The introductory chapter is also a new contribution, in which the background, assignment and organisation of the White Paper Pro- ject is presented in more detail. Some of the original texts have not been included in the English version, namely the Archbishop’s pref- ace and the Sami-language chapter summaries. We would like to express our gratitude to the Church of Sweden Research Department for granting us permission to publish an extended English version of the official final report. This edition is financed by the research project “Sami Voices and Sorry Churches: Use of History in Church-Sami Reconciliation Processes”, funded by the Swedish Research Council Formas, and is included in the academic book series Religion i Norrland. Finally, we would like to thank all the authors and translators for their various contributions to the production of this book. Lars Hübinette translated Chapters 1 and 12, and Siân Marlow translated Chapters 2–11. We hope that this English version will make it pos- sible for an international audience to inform themselves about the historical relations between the Church of Sweden and the Sami people as well as the ongoing reconciliation process, of which the White Paper Project is an integrated part. Umeå University, 18 June, 2018 The Editors 7 Daniel Lindmark & Olle Sundström 1. The Church of Sweden and the Sami — a White Paper Project Background, Assignment and Organisation This book deals with the historical relations between the Church of Sweden and the Sami people, from the Middle Ages up to contempo- rary times. Geographically, the area is restricted to the part of Sápmi (‘the Sami land’) that can be found within the borders of present-day Sweden. The traditional area of Sami presence includes major parts of northern Fenno-Scandia and the Kola Peninsula. Today the total number of Sami is approximately 100,000, the largest group being Norwegian citizens. In Sweden, the Sami are between 20,000 and 40,000. Since there are no ethnic censuses in Sweden, estimations vary depending on the sources and methods used. Traditionally, the Sami were a nomadic population of hunters, fishers and reindeer herders that migrated in small groups following their reindeer. Starting in the late 16th century, the intensive breed- ing of small herds was gradually abandoned in Sweden in favour of extensive stock raising with larger herds moving from their summer pastures in the mountains to their winter habitats closer to the coast. Many Sami people continued to make their living in the forest areas, where they supplemented their small-scale herding with fishing and hunting. When abandoning their traditional trades, the Sami were no longer recognised as Sami in the population registers. Today 9 there are close to 4,700 reindeer owners in Sweden, ninety percent of whom can be found in Norrbotten County, the northernmost region in the country. For centuries reindeer herders have been organised in pastoralistic districts, siidas (‘Sami villages’, Sw. same byar, formerly lappbyar). In 1977, the Sami minority population in Sweden was recognised as an indigenous people by the Swedish Parliament. The Swedish government has never ratified the ILO Convention no. 169 on the rights of indigenous peoples. However, in the 2011 Swedish Con- stitution, the Sami occupy a unique position among the country’s minorities, being the only ones referred to as a people. Since the year 2000, the Sami language is one of five acknowledged national minority languages. This gives the Sami speakers the right to use their language in contacts with authorities in certain municipali- ties. The Sami language belongs to the Finno-Ugric group of lan- guages. The language is divided into a dozen varieties. North Sami, Lule Sami and South Sami have the largest number of speakers, in Sweden as well as in Sápmi in its entirety. Among the Sami varie- ties, only the most closely related varieties are mutually intelligible. Since the Scandinavian languages belong to the Germanic language family, they do not share any characteristics with Sami. The Church has long been engaged in the creation of a Sami written language, from the 18th century efforts to create a standard written language to more recent work involving the major Sami varieties. The indigenous religion of the Sami was tightly connected to their way of living — to their lands and livelihood, to their homes and families. Religious practices and conceptions varied depending on region, main occupation, sex, age etc. The religion of the nomadic reindeer herders in the mountains differed somewhat from that of the semi-nomadic hunters in the taiga or the settled fishers on the coast. Women of a certain age had their own rituals — mostly per- formed at home and dedicated to female invisible beings presumed