The sense of time in the north: a Sámi perspective

• Published in: Polar Record
• Main Author: Mazzullo, Nuccio
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge University Press (CUP) 2012
• Subjects: Polar Record; Sámi; Lapland
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s003224741200006x; https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S003224741200006X

ABSTRACT This paper refers to some aspects of the theoretical anthropological debate on the perception of time and I shall argue, following Ingold (2000) that amongst the Sámi people time is understood as an unfolding of interrelated tasks, rather than as a linear succession of standardised and arbitrary units. I also argue that the Sámi perception of time is not opposed to the western perception, but rather entails a different approach to the significance of clock time. The results of my fieldwork, conducted among the Sámi people in Finnish Lapland, lend support to the idea that the basis for a people's shared understanding and subjective experience of time lies in the interaction of skilful agents in carrying out diverse but interrelated tasks. It is not sufficient to live in a place, to belong to a particular ethnic group or to be engaged in the same subsistence activity to perceive time in a certain fashion. No matter how much we change the combination of actors, the perception of time is generated in each case through situated activity within the landscape.