Saami Languages

The Saami languages belong to the indigenous languages of Europe and to the most closely cognate languages of the Baltic-Finnish languages. There are a total of ten Saami languages: The western Saami languages include South, Ume, Pite, Lule and North Saami, while the eastern Saami languages are Inari, Skolt, Akkala, Kildin and Ter Saami. The Saami languages are spoken in four states: Finland, Sweden, Norway and Russia. There are 60,000 – 100,000 Saami people (depending on the counting system), ca. 6,000 of which live in Finland.

Three Saami languages are spoken in Finland: Inari, Skolt and North Saami. Each language has its own literary language and orthography, and the speakers of the different Saami languages cannot understand each other unless they learn the other Saami languages as foreign languages. Even though multilingualism has always been part of the Saami culture, many Saami people have lost their mother tongue because of the pressure from the majority language. Only half of the Saami people living in Finland speak Saami as their mother tongue. Consequently, the revival and supporting of the Saami languages is one of the most important missions in the Nordic countries.

Since 1992 the Saami languages in Finland have had an official status in the home region of the Saami people, i.e. in the municipalities of Enontekiö, Inari and Utsjoki, as well as in the northern part of the municipality of Sodankylä. This means in practice that the Saami people are entitled to use their mother tongue in offices and hospitals. North Saami is the principal teaching language in some of the schools in Inari and Utsjoki, and it is now even possible to take the matriculation examination in North Saami.

Besides the Arctic area, there are Saami people living all over in Finland: the largest `Saami colony' in Finland is Helsinki, where there are 400 - 500 Saami people. Utsjoki is the only municipality with a majority of Saami-speaking inhabitants. The Saami language spoken there is North Saami, the most widely spread and best-known of the Saami languages. 75 per cent of all Saami-speaking people in Norway, Sweden and Finland speak North Saami. In Finland, the number of the speakers of North Saami is at least 2,000 people.

As for the people speaking Skolt and Inari Saami, they live mostly in the municipality of Inari, which is the only four-language municipality in Finland: the official communications are aways in Finnish, Inari Saami, Skolt Saami and North Saami.

The speakers of Skolt Saami, some 400 persons, used to live in the Petsamo region, but after the war they were settled in the Sevettijärvi and Nellim area. The Inari Saami-speaking people, ca. 350 persons at present, are the indigenous people of Inari. Their Association Anarâškielâ servi strives to revive Inari Saami, and they have already achieved good results with the language nest method.

More information:  

• Aikio, Ante 2003: The geographical and sociolinguistic situation. – Siiddastallan – from Lapp Communities to Modern Sámi Life, Jukka Pennanen and Klemetti Näkkäläjärvi (eds.). Publication of the Inari Sámi Museum, Number 5. Inari. P. 34–40.
• Sammallahti, Pekka 1998: The Saami Languages. An Introduction. Kárášjohka 

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