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Norwegianization (''Fornorsking av samer'') was an official policy carried out by the Norwegian government directed at the Sámi and later the Kven people of northern Norway, in which the goal was to assimilate non-Norwegian-speaking native populations into an ethnically and culturally uniform Norwegian population. The assimilation process began in the 1700s, and was at that point motivated by a clear religious agenda. Over the course of the 1800s it became increasingly influenced by Social Darwinism and
nationalism Nationalism is an idea and movement that holds that the nation should be congruent with the State (polity), state. As a movement, nationalism tends to promote the interests of a particular nation (as in a in-group and out-group, group of peo ...
, in which the Sámi people and their culture were regarded as primitive and uncivilised. As such, it was argued that they needed to succumb to the Norwegian
nation state A nation state is a political unit where the state and nation are congruent. It is a more precise concept than "country", since a country does not need to have a predominant ethnic group. A nation, in the sense of a common ethnicity, may ...
. After the
Second World War World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposi ...
, the race based argument for assimilation lost significant ideological pull. This was also the period in time in which Norway's welfare system was cemented. As such, the continued assimilation policy was framed as part of the
social development Social development can refer to: * Psychosocial development * Social change * Social development theory * Social Development (journal) * Social emotional development * Social progress or social regress The word decadence, which at first meant ...
of Sámi areas. In 1997, the King of Norway, HM King Harald V acknowledged the actions of the Norwegian State, and made an official apology on behalf of the government to the Sámi and Kven People, becoming the first representative to do so: "The state of Norway was founded on the territory of two peoples - the Sámi people and the Norwegians. Sámi history is closely intertwined with Norwegian history. Today, we express our regret on behalf of the state for the injustice committed against the Sámi people through its harsh policy of Norwegianization."


Missionary work in Sámi areas

In the
Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire ...
, the Church conducted missionary work in Sámi areas, initially prioritizing areas at the coast or around the fjords, where an increasing amount of the Norwegian population was settling. The Church and the missionaries decided early on that they should preach to the Sámi in their
mother tongue A first language, native tongue, native language, mother tongue or L1 is the first language or dialect that a person has been exposed to from birth or within the critical period. In some countries, the term ''native language'' or ''mother tong ...
. As such, starting in the 1630s, religious materials were translated into Sámi languages to be used in the Church and for educational purposes. The most intensive period of missionary work took place between 1650 and 1750. It was organized by the Danish-Norwegian state, and was led by the Norwegian priest
Thomas von Westen Thomas von Westen (13 September 1682 – 9 April 1727) was a Norwegian Lutheran priest and missionary. He was a driving force in the Sami mission, and founded the education institution ''Seminarium Scholasticum'', the later Seminarium Lapponic ...
. In 1714, he became involved in the Danish-Norwegian "Lapplandsmisjonen", which conducted missionary work in Sámi areas. In 1717, he was involved in the establishment of the school ''
Seminarium Lapponicum Seminarium Lapponicum was an educational institution established in Trondheim, Norway. The mission of the school was to educate teachers and missionaries to teach Samis using their own Sami language. Seminarium Lapponicum was established in Tron ...
'' in
Trondheim Trondheim ( , , ; sma, Tråante), historically Kaupangen, Nidaros and Trondhjem (), is a city and municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. As of 2020, it had a population of 205,332, was the third most populous municipality in Norway, an ...
, in which teachers, priests and missionaries were educated in order to conduct Sámi missionary work. Westen contributed with education in Sámi language and literature, and additionally developed the first Sámi textbooks. In the beginning, the missionary work and Christian education was carried out in Sámi languages. However, a more nationalistic and civilizational mindset developed over the course of the 1700s and 1800s, during which Sámi language and culture came to be regarded as "feral" and "devilish". As a result, the government's and Church's perception of Sámi languages shifted as well. After this, the languages were regarded as instruments for Sámi
spirituality The meaning of ''spirituality'' has developed and expanded over time, and various meanings can be found alongside each other. Traditionally, spirituality referred to a religious process of re-formation which "aims to recover the original shape ...
and culture, and thus something that needed to be suppressed. Some historians consider the assimilation policy of the 1800s to be a result of the increased nationalism that arose during the establishment of the Norwegian nation state following 1814. Others highlight the links between the
theology Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing th ...
behind the missionary work of the 1600s and 1700s, and the
ideology An ideology is a set of beliefs or philosophies attributed to a person or group of persons, especially those held for reasons that are not purely epistemic, in which "practical elements are as prominent as theoretical ones." Formerly applied pri ...
that was used to justify the later assimilation policies. It has been concluded that the
narrative A narrative, story, or tale is any account of a series of related events or experiences, whether nonfictional ( memoir, biography, news report, documentary, travelogue, etc.) or fictional ( fairy tale, fable, legend, thriller, novel, etc ...
that portrayed the Sámi people as
underdeveloped Underdevelopment, in the context of international development, reflects a broad condition or phenomena defined and critiqued by theorists in fields such as economics, development studies, and postcolonial studies. Used primarily to distinguish s ...
and uncivilized had its origins in theological convictions, and that these informed the subsequent sense of Norwegian Nationalism.


The Norwegianization

Historian Henry Minde argues that the assimilation of the Sámi population at the hands of the Norwegian government began in earnest in 1851, and that it continued until the Alta Controversy and establishment of the Sámi parliament in 1987. Minde divides the Norwegian assimilation policy into four phases.


The Transition Period 1850–1870

In this period, two different belief systems and ideologies influenced the debate concerning assimilation policies. One branch argued for the active use of Sámi languages in educational and religious environments, while the other meant that all education should be conducted in Norwegian, in order to make the Norwegianization as effective as possible. They were, however, united in their goal of fully assimilating the Sámi population into Norwegian culture and society. A fund was established by the
Storting The Storting ( no, Stortinget ) (lit. the Great Thing) is the supreme legislature of Norway, established in 1814 by the Constitution of Norway. It is located in Oslo. The unicameral parliament has 169 members and is elected every four years ...
in 1851, with the express purpose of financing the Norwegianization of Sámi people. The money was used for a number of purposes, among which were the education of teachers, pay rises for teachers with particularly effective Norwegianization methods, and the rewarding of schoolchildren who were quick to learn Norwegian.


The Consolidation Period 1870–1905

The regulations for schools with Sámi and Kven pupils in
Finnmark Finnmark (; se, Finnmárku ; fkv, Finmarku; fi, Ruija ; russian: Финнмарк) was a county in the northern part of Norway, and it is scheduled to become a county again in 2024. On 1 January 2020, Finnmark was merged with the neighbour ...
and Nord-Troms became increasingly strict throughout the later half of the 1800s. The opportunity to use Sámi language as part of the education became more and more limited. Around 1870, the Sámi became the subject of negative scientific attention. The teachings of
phrenology Phrenology () is a pseudoscience which involves the measurement of bumps on the skull to predict mental traits.Wihe, J. V. (2002). "Science and Pseudoscience: A Primer in Critical Thinking." In ''Encyclopedia of Pseudoscience'', pp. 195–203. C ...
were used in order to determine their race and intelligence. To this end, Sámi graves were opened and their skeletons removed. In 1899, ''Wexelsenplakaten'' was passed, an official instruction which forbade Sámi people and Kvens from acting as educators in
multilingual Multilingualism is the use of more than one language, either by an individual speaker or by a group of speakers. It is believed that multilingual speakers outnumber monolingual speakers in the world's population. More than half of all ...
schools. This was the beginning of a full-blown assimilation policy, in which the government stated that the goal was to reduce the sense of identity and community within
minority group The term 'minority group' has different usages depending on the context. According to its common usage, a minority group can simply be understood in terms of demographic sizes within a population: i.e. a group in society with the least number o ...
s, and to utilize public institutions in order to foster stronger feelings of Norwegian nationalism in Kven and Sámi communities. In 1901, the first boarding schools for Sámi and Kven pupils were established. These were also used as
chapels A chapel is a Christian place of prayer and worship that is usually relatively small. The term has several meanings. Firstly, smaller spaces inside a church that have their own altar are often called chapels; the Lady chapel is a common type ...
, and the priests acted as
de facto ''De facto'' ( ; , "in fact") describes practices that exist in reality, whether or not they are officially recognized by laws or other formal norms. It is commonly used to refer to what happens in practice, in contrast with '' de jure'' ("by l ...
members of the school boards. The purpose of the boarding schools was to isolate the pupils from their roots and communities, thus making the assimilation process more effective. At the same time, the Norwegian government conducted a systematic Norwegianization of place names in Finnmark, replacing the original Sámi names with Norwegian ones. This was done in order to normalize and historicize Norwegian settlement in Sámi areas. This phase of the Norwegianization was ideologically grounded in nationalism and social darwinism. Not all communities were affected during this period. Local government correspondences in the Sami and Kven languages were found in the archives of Kistrand between 1860 and 1910, indicating that some communities avoided or did not implement as strong of assimilatory processes as others.


The Culmination Period 1905–1950

In this period, the ideological reasoning behind the assimilation policy continued to evolve, influenced in part by the dissolution of the union between Norway and Sweden in 1905. Around this time, it became legal to deny Sámi and Kven people the right to lease or buy land in Finnmark. The scope of the Norwegianization process is clearly illustrated in the ethnic identities reported in
censuses A census is the procedure of systematically acquiring, recording and calculating information about the members of a given population. This term is used mostly in connection with national population and housing censuses; other common censuses incl ...
from this period. In 1930, 61% of the population in
Kvænangen Kvænangen ( sme, Návuotna; fkv, Naavuono) is a municipality in Troms og Finnmark county, Norway. The administrative centre of the municipality is the village of Burfjord. The European route E6 highway goes through the municipality and ove ...
reported that they were Sámi (44%) or Kven (17%), while 39% described themselves as ethnically Norwegian. In the census from 1950, 0% of the people in the same area reported that they were of Sámi or Kven ethnicity.


Sámi opposition and resistance

In the time leading up to the
First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was List of wars and anthropogenic disasters by death toll, one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, ...
, the Sámi opposition to the assimilation policy grew stronger. During the
1906 Norwegian parliamentary election Parliamentary elections were held in Norway between 5 and 27 August 1906, with a second round held between 26 August and 22 October.Dieter Nohlen & Philip Stöver (2010) ''Elections in Europe: A data handbook'', p1438 It was the first parliament ...
, Sámi politician Isak Saba was elected as a representative for
Arbeiderpartiet The Labour Party ( nb, Arbeiderpartiet; nn, Arbeidarpartiet; A/Ap; se, Bargiidbellodat), formerly The Norwegian Labour Party ( no, Det norske Arbeiderparti, DNA), is a social-democratic political party in Norway. It is positioned on the centr ...
. In 1907, Just Quigstad published a book that documented the Norwegianization process up until that point. He was also one of the first people to argue for the Sámi people as an ethnic group with claim to their own rights. The opposition against the Norwegianization culminated in 1917, when the first Sámi Assembly took place in Trondheim. However, despite the increased resistance from the Sámi people, the Norwegian government continued to enforce their assimilation policy well into the 1900s. The influence of social darwinism on Norwegian politics continued to be evident. Christen Andreas Brygfjeld (1863-1952), who had a central role in the country's assimilation policy, was clearly influenced by racist ideology, claiming that the "Sámi race" was inferior to the "Norwegian Race". In 1923, he wrote that "the Lapps", a slur used on the Sámi population, lacked both the ability and the motivation to use their language in written form. Furthermore, he described them as the most underdeveloped and loathsome of groups in Finnmark, claiming that they made up a disproportionate portion of the people in need of psychiatric care or
special education Special education (known as special-needs education, aided education, exceptional education, alternative provision, exceptional student education, special ed., SDC, or SPED) is the practice of educating students in a way that accommodates th ...
. The introduction of the 7-year school in 1936 represented a further tightening of the assimilation policy, as it resulted in the
Finnish language Finnish ( endonym: or ) is a Uralic language of the Finnic branch, spoken by the majority of the population in Finland and by ethnic Finns outside of Finland. Finnish is one of the two official languages of Finland (the other being Swedi ...
being banned in educational settings.


The Dismantling 1950–1980

Wexelsenplakaten of 1898, which forbade the use of Sámi languages in school settings, continued to be enforced throughout the 1950s, and, in some parts of the country, into the 1960s. On 1. January in 1956, during Einar Gerhardsen's third Cabinet, "Samekomiteen" was established. The
committee A committee or commission is a body of one or more persons subordinate to a deliberative assembly. A committee is not itself considered to be a form of assembly. Usually, the assembly sends matters into a committee as a way to explore them more ...
's attitude signaled an important break with the politics and perspectives of the Norwegian government's assimilation policy. It argued that the government's policy concerning the Sámi population should focus on strengthening the position of Sámi people as a group, and proposed a number of measures aimed at achieving equal rights between the Sámi and Norwegians. However, the Sámi people was still not considered to be an ethnic minority, but rather referred to as Sámi-speaking Norwegians. This was because the government thought that a person's relationship to their Sámi culture and identity should be determined by themselves. However, the right to use Sámi languages in education, including as a primary language, was instated in 1967. Simultaneously, an increased sense of identity sprang forth in Sámi communities. From the mid-1970s, the Sámi people begun to be thought of as an indigenous population, and the fight for Sámi rights was reframed as part of an international movement. " Samerettsutvalget" was established in the 1980s, with a mandate to assess the political and cultural rights of the Sámi people. Despite this, there has never been a public investigation into the treatment of Sámi or Kven people at the hands of the Norwegian government. In the same vein, Norwegian authorities have avoided taking responsibility for the consequences the assimilation policies had on both private individuals and the Sámi population as a group.


Consequences of the Norwegianization

The purpose of the assimilation policy was undoubtedly to eradicate the culture, language, and history that contributed to the formation of Sámi and Kven/Finnish identity. This was true both on the level of the individual, and for the groups as entities. One of the results of the Norwegianization was that the number of Sámi people who stated that they were of Norwegian ethnicity steadily increased over the span of the late 1800s and 1900s. The Norwegianization is also considered to be one of the reasons as to why many people with ethnically Sámi backgrounds developed a negative view of Sámi language and culture. Sámi ethnicity was grouped together with the blind, deaf, and mentally deranged in public censuses until 1920. As such, they were thought of as " abnormal", an idea that had its roots in the concept of
ethnic cleansing Ethnic cleansing is the systematic forced removal of ethnic, racial, and religious groups from a given area, with the intent of making a region ethnically homogeneous. Along with direct removal, extermination, deportation or population transfer ...
.


See also

*
Sámi history The Sámi people (also Saami) are an Indigenous people Indigenous peoples of Europe, of northern Europe inhabiting Sápmi, which today encompasses northern parts of Sweden, Norway, Finland, and the Kola Peninsula of Russia. The traditional Sámi ...
*
Kautokeino rebellion The Sami revolt in Guovdageaidnu, also known as the Kautokeino uprising, was a revolt in the town of Kautokeino in northern Norway in 1852 by a group of Sami who attacked representatives of the Norwegian authorities. The rebels killed the local ...
* Environmental racism in Europe


References


Further reading

*Josefsen, Eva (2001) ''Challenging Politics: Indigenous Peoples' Experiences with Political Parties and Elections'' (Kathrin Wessendorf, ed., International Work Group for Indigenous Affairs.Chapter 2, Page 68) * Hansen, Lars Ivar; Bjørnar Olsen (2004) ''Samenes historie fram til 1750'' (Cappelen Damm Akademisk)


External links


Norwegian Government website - ''Sami and Norwegian history - a few points''
(English version not available) {{Cultural assimilation Cultural assimilation Society of Norway Norwegian nationalism Kven culture Finland–Norway relations Persecution of Sámi people Racism in Norway Sámi culture Sámi history Sámi politics Displacement of indigenous children History of Finnmark