Sami

From Srafopedia

The Sami people (also Sámi, Saami, Lapps, sometimes also Laplanders) are an indigenous people of northern Europe inhabiting Sápmi, which today encompasses parts of northern Sweden, Norway, Finland and the Kola Peninsula of Russia. Their ancestral lands span across an area the size of Sweden in the Nordic countries. The Sami people are among the largest indigenous groups in Europe. Their languages are the Sami languages, which are classified as Finno-Ugric.

The cultural assimilation over many years of the Sami people in the four countries makes it difficult to estimate the numbers of Sami. However, the population is estimated at about 85,000. The Norwegian state recognizes any Norwegian as Sami if he or she has one great-grandparent whose home language was Sami, but there is not, and has not been, any registration of the home language spoken by Norwegian people. Roughly half of all Sami live in Norway, but many live in Sweden as well. Finland and Russia are also home to smaller groups located in the far north. The Sami in Russia were forced by the Soviet authorities to relocate to a collective called Lovozero/Lujávri, in the central part of the Kola Peninsula.

Traditionally, the Sami had a variety of livelihoods; fishing on the coast and in the inland, trapping animals for fur, sheep herding, etc. The best known livelihood is reindeer herding, but only a small percentage of the Sami have been mainly reindeer herders over the last centuries. Today, many Sami lead modern lives in the cities inside and outside the traditional Sami area, with modern jobs. Some 10% still practice reindeer herding, which for traditional and cultural reasons is reserved for Sami people in some parts of Nordic countries.

(Source: Wikipedia)