Giellariššu : Indigenous language revitalisation in the city

• Published in: Multiethnica: Journal of the Hugo Valentin Centre
• Main Authors: Outakoski, Hanna-Máret, Vangsnes, Øystein A.
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: UiT The Arctic University of Norway, Umeå University and Sámi University of Applied Sciences 2021
• Subjects: Specific Languages; Studier av enskilda språk; Learning; Lärande; Norway; Tromsø; North Sámi; Northern Norway; Sámi; South Sámi
• Online Access: http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:uu:diva-472008; https://doi.org/10.33063/diva-472008

About 10% of all pupils in grades 1–10 who learn Sámi in Norwegian schools live in the city of Tromsø in Northern Norway. This group totalled 232 pupils in the school year 2020/2021,and the pupils went to over twenty different schools. All but one were pupils of North Sámi,and a handful also received instruction in South Sámi. In Umeå in Sweden, 42 pupils attended mother tongue classes in Sámi in the winter of 2021, divided among four different varieties of Sámi, reflecting the diverse composition of the Sámi population in the area. In neither city, the Sámi pupils exceed three percent of their municipal peer group and they are embedded in local communities fully dominated by the Norwegian and Swedish majority language,respectively. We discuss the challenges and opportunities that Sámi children who grow up intwo urban environments face when reclaiming, maintaining, and developing their indigenousheritage language, and we report from piloted language (re)vitalisation activities. Giellariššu gathers pupils from different schools regularly for activities in Sámi, led by adult proficient speakers with the goal to strengthen the pupils’ language skills and the social bonds between children who otherwise do not meet on a regular basis. https://doi.org/10.33063/diva-472008