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Speaker 1: This Day in History Class is a production of I

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Speaker 1: Heart Radio. Hello and Welcome to This Day in History Class,

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Speaker 1: a show that pays tribute to people of the past

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Speaker 1: by telling their stories. Today I'm Gabe Lousier and today

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Speaker 1: we're looking at the time when the oldest communities of

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Speaker 1: Europe came together across national borders to seek solutions to

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Speaker 1: the injustices that plagued them all. The day was February six, seventeen.

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Speaker 1: The first national Meeting of the sam A people was

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Speaker 1: held in Tronheim, Norway. The meeting took place at a

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Speaker 1: low point in sam A history, when the nation's assimilation process,

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Speaker 1: known as the Norwegianization Policy, was in full swing. The

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Speaker 1: culture and language of the Samai people was gradually being erased,

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Speaker 1: so a nationwide political meeting was called to discuss their

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Speaker 1: interests and how to protect their way of life. The

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Speaker 1: sam A people are the oldest native inhabitants of Europe

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Speaker 1: and the only recognized indigenous people of the European Union.

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Speaker 1: Their culture can be traced back tens of thousands of

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Speaker 1: years and was largely shaped by the inhospitable conditions of

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Speaker 1: their home in and around the Arctic Circle. The traditional

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Speaker 1: name for the vast region they inhabited was sep May,

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Speaker 1: and it encompassed parts of what we now know as Norway, Sweden,

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Speaker 1: Finland and Russia. The sama people were the dominant culture

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Speaker 1: there until about the fifteenth century, when Norwegian farmers began

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Speaker 1: to colonize their lands to the north. That encroachment forced

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Speaker 1: to change in sam A culture, which up until then

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Speaker 1: had been centered on reindeer hunting. Instead, the Samai people

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Speaker 1: became nomadic reindeer herders, roaming across the northern reaches of

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Speaker 1: Norway and beyond. As time went on, their way of

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Speaker 1: life was complicated again by the establishment of national borders.

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Speaker 1: Sam A herders, who had once wandered as they pleased,

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Speaker 1: suddenly found themselves hindered by invisible lines. As a result,

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Speaker 1: sam A culture began to stagnate and the population dwindled.

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Speaker 1: Today there are only about eighty thousand sam A people,

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Speaker 1: representing a small fraction of the populations of Scandinavia and

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Speaker 1: Russia's Kola Peninsula. While the creation of formal states played

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Speaker 1: a major role in sam A decline, an even bigger

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Speaker 1: factor was the harsh assimilation policy imposed by Norway in

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Speaker 1: the mid nineteenth century. The justifications for the policy varied

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Speaker 1: throughout the eighteen hundreds. At one point it was part

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Speaker 1: of a religious agenda, a nationwide effort to convert the

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Speaker 1: Heathen sam A to Christianity. Later on, the narrative shifted

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Speaker 1: to nationalism and so Shoal Darwinism, with the Sama cast

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Speaker 1: as an uncivilized culture that threatened to erode Norwegian society.

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Speaker 1: During this period, sam A children were routinely separated from

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Speaker 1: their parents, and many women were forcibly sterilized. These policies

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Speaker 1: were in line with those used against other indigenous people

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Speaker 1: and national minorities and countries such as Norway and Sweden.

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Speaker 1: This state sanctioned oppression continued well into the nineteen hundreds,

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Speaker 1: leading to the further marginalization and impoverishment of the Samai people.

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Speaker 1: At the dawn of the twentieth century, different sama groups

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Speaker 1: began to meet and discuss their political persecution. County level

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Speaker 1: meetings were held throughout the southern Samai region, and in

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Speaker 1: nineteen ten, the helgaaland Sammy Association was founded. One of

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Speaker 1: the leaders behind that grassroots organization was Elsa Loula Renberg,

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Speaker 1: a sam A woman and resident of Helga Land, the

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Speaker 1: most southerly district in northern Norway. It was her idea

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Speaker 1: to hold a national Congress in Trondheim so that sam

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Speaker 1: A communities could share ideas and build a coalition to

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Speaker 1: fight for sam A rights. Thanks to Rendbergh's efforts and

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Speaker 1: to those of other early advocates, including sam A teacher

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Speaker 1: Daniel Mortensen, the nationwide meeting went forward as planned on

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Speaker 1: February six, nineteen seventeen. More than a hundred representatives, many

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Speaker 1: of whom were women, gathered in Trondheim's Methodist Church. Over

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Speaker 1: the course of four days. They discussed a range of topics,

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Speaker 1: including reindeer grazing rights, which had been greatly restricted by

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Speaker 1: legislation passed in the late eighteen hundreds. Another burning issue

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Speaker 1: was schooling. The Norwegian government had made no effort to

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Speaker 1: accommodate sam A students. In fact, just the opposite. The

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Speaker 1: nation's school laws required all children in Norway to be

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Speaker 1: educated in Norwegian. Not only did the policy make it

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Speaker 1: harder for sam ANY children to keep up with their lessons,

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Speaker 1: it also forbade them from speaking their native language in public.

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Speaker 1: The school laws remained in effect from the end of

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Speaker 1: the nineteenth century all the way until World War Two.

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Speaker 1: As a result, three sam A dialects are now considered extinct,

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Speaker 1: and only a third of the current population can actually

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Speaker 1: speak their language, while even fewer can write it. The

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Speaker 1: National Congress in nineteen seventeen marked the beginning of the

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Speaker 1: political organization of the Samai people. Their struggle for rights

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Speaker 1: continues to this day, but the cruelest policies against them

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Speaker 1: have long since been repealed. For example, sam A children

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Speaker 1: now have the right to be educated in their own language,

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Speaker 1: and lessons about sam A culture and history are part

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Speaker 1: of the standard curriculum taught to all children in Norway.

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Speaker 1: In recent decades, the Norwegian government has also begun recognizing

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Speaker 1: the sam Ai people in several official capacities, including by

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Speaker 1: honoring indigenous land ownership rights. Part of this ongoing reconciliation

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Speaker 1: was the establishment of sam A National Day, which was

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Speaker 1: adopted at the sam A Conference and celebrated for the

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Speaker 1: first time the following year. As you may have guessed,

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Speaker 1: the date chosen was February six in honor of the

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Speaker 1: first national meeting held in Trondheim. Today, sam A National

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Speaker 1: Day is celebrated all across Norway, as well as in Sweden, Finland,

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Speaker 1: and the Kola Peninsula in Russia. The occasion is marked

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Speaker 1: in all the ways you might expect. The sam A

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Speaker 1: flag is raised, the national anthem is sung, and traditional foods,

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Speaker 1: including reindeer meat, are eden. Most sam A people also

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Speaker 1: put on traditional handmade clothing, and those who can still

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Speaker 1: speak the language do so proudly. I'm Gabe Louzier and

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Speaker 1: hopefully you now know a little more about history today

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Speaker 1: than you did yesterday. If you have a second and

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Speaker 1: rate and review the show on Apple Podcasts, or you

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Speaker 1: can get in touch directly by writing to This Day

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Speaker 1: at I heart media dot com. Thanks to Chandler Mace

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Speaker 1: for producing the show, and thank you for listening. I'll

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Speaker 1: see you back here again tomorrow for another Day in

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Speaker 1: History class