The processes of assimilation: Experiences and strategies of resistance

In Sweden, the minority policy towards the South Saami population was part assimilation, part segregation. The assimilation policy period is in Norway often referred to as the Norwegianization policy as its main aims was to initiate a language and culture shift among the Saami population, making them fully Norwegian in terms of language, culture and customs. This policy was primarily conducted through the school system. The first concern of this part of the project is: How does the use of boarding schools in the South Saami area (Norway/Sweden) frame the development of South Saami culture, language and identity, and how are experiences and consequences of these processes related through the South Saami memory culture? One major consequence of these policies were that the intergenerational transference of the language as well as the Saami ethnic identity ceased in a large part of the South Saami population, and the language was on its way to extinction. The second research question of WP1 therefore concerns the identity implications of the language loss: How are the choices of the previous generations, be it language shift or language maintenance, evaluated in today’s memory narratives? How and to what degree did linguistic choices of the time reflect identity choices?  The third set of questions investigate the South Saami community’s responses and resistance strategies under the pressure of assimilation and integration on the collective level, be it as accommodation or resistance. How has the South Saami identity has been shaped and negotiated in the light of the memory culture?