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TABLE OF CONTENTS Table of Contents INTRODUCTION................................................................................................1 Research Problem....................................................................................................................................1 My Study Cases........................................................................................................................................3 THEORY AND METHODOLOGY.....................................................................5 Overview...................................................................................................................................................6 Mapping the Concept of ‘Discourse’......................................................................................................7 The Ethics of Autobiography3................................................................................................................9 Making Meaning of My Experience in Tromsø, Sapmi and Norway................................................11 Focusing on Tromsø Indigenous Academia .......................................................................................12 International Indigenous Discourse. Political and Juridical Dimensions. .......................................14 Indigenous Movement and ‘Symbolic Action’ Strategy. A Sami Case.............................................16 Indigenous Academic Discourse6 in terms of Symbolic Action ........................................................20 Study Cases: Analysis of Articles and Interviews...............................................................................28 ANDE SOMBY: ‘SOME HYBRIDS OF THE LEGAL SITUATION OF THE SAAMI PEOPLE IN NORWAY’.......................................................................32 Introduction............................................................................................................................................32 First Impressions. Yoik, Orality, Performativity................................................................................35 Ande’s Project .......................................................................................................................................39 1. Sami Artistic Manifestations as Discursive Practices in Academia...............................................39 2. Performativity as Discursive Effect..................................................................................................42 3. Cultural Mediation as Strategy for Indigenous Legal and Political Claims.................................43 Yoik and Rhetoric of Law.....................................................................................................................51 Ande’s Persuasion Levels......................................................................................................................52 Conclusion...............................................................................................................................................53 HENRY MINDE: ‘ASSIMILATION OF THE SAMI–IMPLEMENTATION AND CONSEQUENCES’.........................................................................................55 Introduction............................................................................................................................................55 First Considerations...............................................................................................................................57 Sami Fund – Now and Then. Political Shift Demands Shift in History Writing .............................58 Signaling ‘Staging’ As Discursive Mode..............................................................................................60 Norwegianisation Strategy....................................................................................................................60 State Institutions and Sami Community in History. Required Paradigmatic Revisions................62 Assimilation Stages. Emplotment of Events Under Focus.................................................................68 ‘Voice’ as Discursive Strategy...............................................................................................................73 Conclusion...............................................................................................................................................76 CONCLUSION...............................................................................................77 WORKS CITED.............................................................................................112 LEGAL DOCUMENTS CITED.......................................................................117 WORKS CONSULTED..................................................................................117 REFERENCE APPENDIX.............................................................................119 Introduction Research Problem Faced with globalization - the neo-liberal market and cultural homogenization - societies are starting to reflect more on their diversity. Processes of cultural differentiation1 parallel the potent processes of uniformisation. Some analysts of culture have turned to ethnic identity politics and highly essentialist notions of culture as ideological support to understand the claims of authenticity and autonomy of the indigenous people. Other analysts of culture have turned towards and preferred instead more politically and historically charged concepts of discourse, interest and strategy. My study is developed, theory- and method-wise, alongside this last front of enquiry. I look at the ways in which the work of Sami researchers – connected with the University of Tromsø and working in different fields – challenges the Western scientific discourse on the indigenous people through cultural mediation. I view cultural mediation, as a continuing process of the mind, not as the step towards compromise. I attempt to identify the elements of innovation and experimentation these Sami researchers bring in with their themes and methods of research with an intention to challenge and create a shift from the ‘Western paradigm’, while mediating aspects of the indigenous culture and reality. By ‘Western paradigm’, I understand the tradition fostered since the Age of Enlightenment in terms of theories, methods and standards, which was built on ideals of objectivism, detachment and universalism, and which allowed for an authoritative and unambiguous position outside the events themselves from which omniscient knowledge was attainable. 2 1 Human diversity has been talked about in various terms. Currently, in an attempt to attenuate conflicts and promote understanding, international politics place emphasis on cultural diversity, a shift from ‘ethnic diversity’, the source of many frictions in various areas. On November 2nd, 2001, UNESCO had adopted by the General Conference at its 31st session a Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity (!). An extract from UNESCO’s draft Programme 2004-2005, Scenario Major Programme IV General Conference, 32nd Session; Paris 2003: 04004: ‘Promoting cultural diversity and intercultural dialogue will be the principal priority and main theme of Major Programme IV. Diversity, if it is to remain creative, must be based on acceptance and dialogue. It cannot survive when communities withdraw into themselves or opt for confrontation. The aim in implementing the programme will therefore be to create conditions in which dialogue and diversity can flourish, on the basis of strategic objectives 7, 8 and 9 relating to culture in the Medium-Term Strategy for 2002-2007 (31 C/4 Approved), that is to say: (i) promoting the drafting and implementation of standard-setting instruments in the cultural field; (ii) encouraging pluralism and dialogue among cultures and civilizations through the promotion of cultural diversity; and (iii) enhancing the linkages between culture and development through capacity-building and sharing of knowledge, in particular by helping Member States to redefine or update the main lines of emphasis of their cultural policies.’ 2 Nevertheless, while the dichotomy ‘Indigenous vs. Western’ is well-tread at this point in history, a less visited territory covers the nuances of this dualism: how these systems of representations build on each other and how new meaning is constructed from this encounter. While the pure (extreme!) dichotomy exists only in theory, in practice the state of facts displays a hybrid situation, where Indigenous and Western tendencies shape each other continuously and I shall try to emphasize these nuances as far as possible. Although I am aware of further variation within the umbrella of ‘Western paradigm’, I sometimes employ the term in this singular form, for didactic purposes, in a more extreme and generalizing understanding, in terms of ‘the West and the Rest’ dichotomy to paraphrase Stuart Hall, for the purpose of demonstrating how symbolic mechanisms function. (Chapter 6: The West and the Rest: Discourse and Power by Staurt Hall, in Stuart, Hall and Gieben, B., Eds.. Formations of Modernity. Polity Press, 1992) 1 Additionally, in the present study I try to see in what ways the steps taken by Sami researchers are strategies of relevance for the projects set up by indigenous research methodology, as described by various theorists. My collateral intention is to identify theoretical and analytical tools to understand the interlocking processes of globalization and