The aim of this project is to investigate howdecolonial research can be conducted in practice whenthe researcher is a member of the majority population.I ask: what does it mean to be an ally as well as anacademic? Through autoethnography and ParticipatoryAction Research (PAR) I am attempting to “decolonisemy mind” in order to unlearn oppressive systems ofknowledge and I am using academic disobedience asan intentional strategy to disrupt colonial epistemichegemonies. Following feminist and other criticaltheory traditions and using decolonial and indigenousresearch ethics I am criticising the remnants of positivistresearch structures that exists within the social sciencesand the colonising, racialised, gendered and classed wayin which knowledge is traditionally constructed.I am also attempting to position PAR as adecolonising research methodology. Because a PARanimator does not have an automatic right to writeup and disseminate the knowledge that has beencollectively constructed by the co-researchers, however,I am inserting myself into the narrative in order toAbstractdisrupt the traditional academic voice. I attempt toquestion critically how I (auto) act in relation to myown culture and Sámi culture (ethno) through theprocess of reflective writing and analysis (graphy) – inother words, autoethnograpy.I set out to conduct a PAR project within a Sámiorganisation in Stockholm but despite my efforts theproject never really got off the ground. So apart fromexploring my own positionality relative to the Sámi,and apart from constructing an argument for decolonialresearch and allyship, this essay also offers my thoughtson why the project didn’t happen and my journey intolearning how to be a better academic ally. / <p>Student thesis MA in Culture, Diaspora and Ethnicity at Birkbeck, University of London. Presented as a seminar in "Kunskapsproduktion bortom normerna". May-Britt Öhman was supervisor to the thesis.</p>

In 1993, Sweden instituted the Sámi Parliament (Sámediggi) as a state agency with the main purpose of representing the indigenous Sámi people externally, as well as monitoring internal cultural affairs, governed by a popularly elected assembly. In the absence of official statistics on the Sámi population, or any formally recognized approaches to define who should count as Sámi, one of the challenging tasks was to create an accurate register of all those who would be eligible to take part in the elections. The idea was to design an electoral roll that would be normatively neutral and have no other functions beyond its core function of being a list of eligible voters, a concept that had already been put in use during the previous initiations of the Sámi Parliaments in Norway and Finland. Previous research from similar contexts, most prominently Norway, shows that electoral rolls of this sort might be attributed other functions by indigenous populations, especially in the absence of other formal devices that can be used to confirm their indigenous identity. It appears that the electoral roll might, under certain circumstances, assume an important and far-reaching role in indigenous institution building. In Sweden, however, similar research is missing. In this study, I examine perceptions within the indigenous Sámi community regarding the central functions of the electoral roll using a constructivist, discourse-theoretic approach. A systematic mapping out of the discourse surrounding the electoral roll, as reflected in public records from within the political sphere of the Sámi Parliament and relevant accounts in Sámi media, reveals that the electoral roll is attributed functions by the Sámi population that go far beyond its original, formalistic design. The act of formally defining a people, regardless of the limitations of the purpose, can seemingly cause unintended and far-reaching consequences, especially when the people itself does not control the definition. The analysis shows a fundamental conflict regarding the competing functions of the electoral roll as both an instrument of representation and a mechanism of identity validation. This influences the power structures between the Sámi people and the Swedish state as well as within the people itself, and affects the ability of the Sámi Parliament to gain legitimacy as an indigenous institution and instrument of self-determination.

Finland is recognized as a country with high human rights standards including the rights of the indigenous people that are protected by various declarations, conventions, and international human rights laws. Finland first enacted a Sámi Parliament Act in 1995 and has most recently in 2019 received criticism from the UN Human Rights Committee for not guaranteeing the rights for the legally recognized indigenous Sámi people living within Finland’s borders. Government proposal to reform the Act sparked the discussion of Sámi rights in Finland in the fall of 2022. Through a critical postcolonial perspective together with examining purposeful sampling material and the reform opposing discourse in the Finnish parliament, this thesis aims to get a view for the reason of the dismissal of the reform. It suggests that Finland’s position as a human rights model country in indigenous people’s rights is questionable in the matter of the Sámi rights.

The work investigates the relationship the Swedish indigenous people, the Sámi people, have towards their cultural remains in the Sámi cultural landscape. It is investigated through a qualitative-comparative literature studie which is primarily conducted through an analysis of four websites; two Sámi controlled websites and two swedish county administration controlled websites. The relationship the Sámi people have towards their ancient cultural remains can be seen through studies of their relationship towards graves and old settlement remains, (swe:kåtatomter) which reflects a relationship that is contested by factors such as the threat of exploitation of the Sámi cultural landscape, and by the challenges that comes with repatriation cases. The work emanates from a postcolonial perspective which can be seen throughout the entire work and which is primarily based on reconciliation as a concept within postcolonial theory

The film representation of the Sámi people has evolved during the last century from the ethnographic portrayals that reproduce a romantic stereotype of the good savages, to feature and documentary films that discuss the Sámi identity and its colonial history. In recent years a new generation of Sámi and Swedish documentary directors have focused their work on analysing the impact that multiple structures of power actually have in the production of the Sámi identity and culture. In this research I explore the intersections of such structures in the documentary road movies Sámi Daughter Yoik (2007) by the Sámi-Swedish director Liselotte Wajstedt, and The Only Image of My Father (2004) by the Swedish director Kine Boman. The main purpose of the research is to examine the discussions of identity that these films propose and to analyse the strategies with which the directors question the simplistic representation of the Sámi people. Based on the postcolonial and intersectional perspectives, the text offers a critique of the discourses of authenticity that confine the Sámi identity into the frame of ethnicity. The study gives special attention to the different layers that the directors' identities involve and their role in the construction of alternative representations of the Sámi people. A relevant finding is that the directors have succeeded in representing the Sámi people as complex and heterogeneous, helped by their choices on genre, authorship and their own approach to identity as a performative, multidimensional and dynamic process.

International human rights committees and special rapporteurs on the situation for indigenous peoples have criticised Sweden for the domestic treatment of Sámi people and for not fully complying with indigenous rights on participation and consultation under international law. Participatory rights and consultation duties for indigenous peoples are important as they function as means of ensuring indigenous influence in decision making, giving effect to their substantive rights to land resources and culture. Swedish law acknowledges rights for Sámi people to be consulted in decision making. However, these peoples still do not have effective influence on issues that affect them in their role as indigenous peoples. As the extraction of natural resources and industrial and other development projects continues, the protection of indigenous Sámi rights in Swedish law need to guarantee that Sámi people have enough influence over land issues and in decision-making processes on matters that concern them. With their traditional knowledge, indigenous peoples may have an important role in environmental management and in efforts on climate change adaptation.

<p>Revoicing Sámi narratives investigates the relationship between storytellers, contexts and collective tradition, based on an analysis of North Sámi narratives published in the early 1900s. This dissertation “revoices” narratives by highlighting the coexistence of different voices or socio-ideological languages in repertoires and by considering Sámi narratives as utterances by storytellers rather than autonomous products of tradition. Thus, this study serves as an act of “revoicing,” of recovering voices that had been silenced by the scientific discourse which enveloped their passage into print.</p><p>Narrators considered “tradition bearers” were interviewed or wrote down folk narratives that were interpreted as representative of a static, dying culture. The approach chosen in this thesis highlights the dynamic and conscious choices of narrative strategies made by these storytellers and the implications of the discourses expressed in narration. By taking into account the intense context of social change going on in Sápmi at the time the narratives emerged, as well as the context that includes narrators, ethnographers and tradition, the analysis demonstrates that storytelling is an elaboration that takes place in negotiation with tradition, genres and individual preferences.</p><p>The repertoires of four storytellers are studied according to a methodological framework consisting in critical discourse analysis from a folkloristic perspective. The analysis underscores the polyphony of the narratives by Johan Turi, who related with skillfulness of tradition by taking position as a conscious social actor. This study also investigates the repertoires of storytellers Ellen Utsi, Per Bær and Isak Eira who were interviewed by the</p><p>Norwegian “lappologist” Just K. Qvigstad. Their contributions to his extensive collection of Sámi narratives express their relation to tradition and to the heteroglossia that surrounded them. Based on a receptionalist approach, this dissertation investigates the implications of these narratives for the North Sámi community at the turn of the twentieth century.</p><p>Storytelling appears to have had a set of functions for community members, from the normative as regards socialization, information and warning against dangers to the defensive with the elaboration of a discourse about solidarity, identity and empowerment.</p>

Revoicing Sámi narratives investigates the relationship between storytellers, contexts and collective tradition, based on an analysis of North Sámi narratives published in the early 1900s. This dissertation “revoices” narratives by highlighting the coexistence of different voices or socio-ideological languages in repertoires and by considering Sámi narratives as utterances by storytellers rather than autonomous products of tradition. Thus, this study serves as an act of “revoicing,” of recovering voices that had been silenced by the scientific discourse which enveloped their passage into print. Narrators considered “tradition bearers” were interviewed or wrote down folk narratives that were interpreted as representative of a static, dying culture. The approach chosen in this thesis highlights the dynamic and conscious choices of narrative strategies made by these storytellers and the implications of the discourses expressed in narration. By taking into account the intense context of social change going on in Sápmi at the time the narratives emerged, as well as the context that includes narrators, ethnographers and tradition, the analysis demonstrates that storytelling is an elaboration that takes place in negotiation with tradition, genres and individual preferences. The repertoires of four storytellers are studied according to a methodological framework consisting in critical discourse analysis from a folkloristic perspective. The analysis underscores the polyphony of the narratives by Johan Turi, who related with skillfulness of tradition by taking position as a conscious social actor. This study also investigates the repertoires of storytellers Ellen Utsi, Per Bær and Isak Eira who were interviewed by the Norwegian “lappologist” Just K. Qvigstad. Their contributions to his extensive collection of Sámi narratives express their relation to tradition and to the heteroglossia that surrounded them. Based on a receptionalist approach, this dissertation investigates the implications of these narratives for the North Sámi community at the turn of the twentieth century. Storytelling appears to have had a set of functions for community members, from the normative as regards socialization, information and warning against dangers to the defensive with the elaboration of a discourse about solidarity, identity and empowerment.

Since the 1980s, there has been a growing consciousness among heritage workers and policy makers about the management of indigenous heritage. Museums, universities, and other cultural institutions around the world have acknowledged that old work practices must be exchanged for new ones, where the indigenous peoples are allowed influence, stewardship, and interpretative prerogative. One result of these efforts is the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (2007). With the breakthrough of public archaeology and community archaeology in the 1990s, these ambitions have also been put into practice in multiple archaeological projects around the globe. In my research, I examine the heritage management system of Sweden, and how this system works in relation to the indigenous Sámi.  Despite being on the retreat geographically for the past few centuries, the Sámi still dispose of about 50% of the area of Sweden for the grazing of their reindeer, which means the historical and cultural landscape of the Sámi is vast and the archaeological traces of their activities are spread over a large area. In Sweden, about 90% of all archaeological projects are due to land development projects and conducted by archaeological companies operating on a commercial market. The remaining 10% are research projects financed by public funding and mostly conducted by museums and universities.  Investigating the Swedish county of Jämtland as a case study and drawing on interviews with ten actors with different perspectives on Sámi heritage, I study what happens when policy meets practice. The indigenous perspective appears to be considered less in contract archaeology than in research projects. Legislation, money, old habits, and the realities of everyday life obstruct indigenous influence. But my research results suggest that there are also ways of improving the system.

The following thesis examines the representation of Sámi that reside in the Swedish part of Lapland. Tourism has been a complement to the traditional occupations for many Sámi. However, representations of Sámi in web-marketing may be misleading the tourists in their understanding of the Indigenous people. The aim of the thesis is to examine regional marketing material in Sweden, found online, through a thematic analysis to highlight patterns and themes that are utilized for a competitiveness in the market. The use of language, when referring to Sámi, and adjectives to describe landscape, food, and people were focused upon. Six webpages were analysed, which showed a strong focus of the marketing material on reindeer, languages, handicrafts and food.