Traditional sports and games among the Sámi people in Northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi): an ethnobiological perspective

INTRODUCTION: Modern sports equipment is nowadays manufactured industrially according to globally accepted and standardized models, but traditionally tools for play and games were prepared from materials found in the local environment. The objective of this article is to investigate various aspects...

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Published in:Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine
Main Authors: Lidström, Isak, Svanberg, Ingvar, Ståhlberg, Sabira
Format: Text
Language:English
Published: BioMed Central 2022
Subjects:
Online Access:http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8934475/
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35305672
https://doi.org/10.1186/s13002-022-00517-9
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spelling ftpubmed:oai:pubmedcentral.nih.gov:8934475 2023-05-15T16:11:50+02:00 Traditional sports and games among the Sámi people in Northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi): an ethnobiological perspective Lidström, Isak Svanberg, Ingvar Ståhlberg, Sabira 2022-03-19 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8934475/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35305672 https://doi.org/10.1186/s13002-022-00517-9 en eng BioMed Central http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8934475/ http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35305672 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13002-022-00517-9 © The Author(s) 2022 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data. CC0 PDM CC-BY J Ethnobiol Ethnomed Research Text 2022 ftpubmed https://doi.org/10.1186/s13002-022-00517-9 2022-03-27T01:39:17Z INTRODUCTION: Modern sports equipment is nowadays manufactured industrially according to globally accepted and standardized models, but traditionally tools for play and games were prepared from materials found in the local environment. The objective of this article is to investigate various aspects of Sámi local knowledge about organisms used for their material culture of traditional sports and games in northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi). What functions did the surrounding biota have in the production of equipment used in sports and games? METHODS: A qualitative method was used; the ethnographic literature and travel narratives have been analyzed particularly for descriptions and notes on traditional games, toys, and sports. RESULTS: Before the turn of the twentieth century, bats, balls, and skis were seldom produced in factories, but by children and adults who utilized available materials from the surrounding environment. The manufacture of tools for play and games was characterized by a rich creativity in the use of various biological and natural resources. A wide range of such resources is presented in this article, among them the bracket fungus Fomitopsis betulina, used for making balls, reindeer antlers utilized for lassoing contests, and pine bark painted with reindeer blood, prepared for playing cards. We also highlight how tools usually associated with means of transport could switch functions and serve playful and competitive purposes, such as skis made of compression pine or walking sticks of birch: The former were used in skiing races, and the latter appeared in fencing competitions. CONCLUSION: The industrialization of the material culture of sports has been contributed to a loss of local knowledge and familiarity with locally available organic stuffs for producing equipment for play and games. By reconnecting with previous knowledge of traditional games, we discover a potentially new direction for modern sports and games, shifting from globalization to environmentalization. Such an environmentalization ... Text Fennoscandia Sámi PubMed Central (PMC) Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine 18 1
institution Open Polar
collection PubMed Central (PMC)
op_collection_id ftpubmed
language English
topic Research
spellingShingle Research
Lidström, Isak
Svanberg, Ingvar
Ståhlberg, Sabira
Traditional sports and games among the Sámi people in Northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi): an ethnobiological perspective
topic_facet Research
description INTRODUCTION: Modern sports equipment is nowadays manufactured industrially according to globally accepted and standardized models, but traditionally tools for play and games were prepared from materials found in the local environment. The objective of this article is to investigate various aspects of Sámi local knowledge about organisms used for their material culture of traditional sports and games in northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi). What functions did the surrounding biota have in the production of equipment used in sports and games? METHODS: A qualitative method was used; the ethnographic literature and travel narratives have been analyzed particularly for descriptions and notes on traditional games, toys, and sports. RESULTS: Before the turn of the twentieth century, bats, balls, and skis were seldom produced in factories, but by children and adults who utilized available materials from the surrounding environment. The manufacture of tools for play and games was characterized by a rich creativity in the use of various biological and natural resources. A wide range of such resources is presented in this article, among them the bracket fungus Fomitopsis betulina, used for making balls, reindeer antlers utilized for lassoing contests, and pine bark painted with reindeer blood, prepared for playing cards. We also highlight how tools usually associated with means of transport could switch functions and serve playful and competitive purposes, such as skis made of compression pine or walking sticks of birch: The former were used in skiing races, and the latter appeared in fencing competitions. CONCLUSION: The industrialization of the material culture of sports has been contributed to a loss of local knowledge and familiarity with locally available organic stuffs for producing equipment for play and games. By reconnecting with previous knowledge of traditional games, we discover a potentially new direction for modern sports and games, shifting from globalization to environmentalization. Such an environmentalization ...
format Text
author Lidström, Isak
Svanberg, Ingvar
Ståhlberg, Sabira
author_facet Lidström, Isak
Svanberg, Ingvar
Ståhlberg, Sabira
author_sort Lidström, Isak
title Traditional sports and games among the Sámi people in Northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi): an ethnobiological perspective
title_short Traditional sports and games among the Sámi people in Northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi): an ethnobiological perspective
title_full Traditional sports and games among the Sámi people in Northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi): an ethnobiological perspective
title_fullStr Traditional sports and games among the Sámi people in Northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi): an ethnobiological perspective
title_full_unstemmed Traditional sports and games among the Sámi people in Northern Fennoscandia (Sápmi): an ethnobiological perspective
title_sort traditional sports and games among the sámi people in northern fennoscandia (sápmi): an ethnobiological perspective
publisher BioMed Central
publishDate 2022
url http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8934475/
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35305672
https://doi.org/10.1186/s13002-022-00517-9
genre Fennoscandia
Sámi
genre_facet Fennoscandia
Sámi
op_source J Ethnobiol Ethnomed
op_relation http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8934475/
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/35305672
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13002-022-00517-9
op_rights © The Author(s) 2022
https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Open AccessThis article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article's Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article's Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/) . The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/ (https://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) ) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated in a credit line to the data.
op_rightsnorm CC0
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op_doi https://doi.org/10.1186/s13002-022-00517-9
container_title Journal of Ethnobiology and Ethnomedicine
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