Cross-border cooperation.
Since 2016 the collaborative partners of the AIDA are the Sámi Archives of the National Archives of Finland, the Ájtte, Swedish Mountain and Sámi museum, and the Sámi University of the Applied Sciences, Sámi allaskuvla.
AIDA II - Archives as Actors -project is led by Anna Westman-Kuhmunen, Ájtte museum.
Image: group image / CJ Utsi, Sajos - Sámi Culture Centre / Ville-Riiko Fofonoff / Sámi Parliament
Sámi ArchivesThe Sámi Archives (Sámi Arkiiva) collects and preserves private archival materials that are mainly donated by individuals, organizations, and societies. However, the archives are not just for storage but also for use – one of the main tasks of the Sámi Archives is to actively advance and promote Sámi studies and to increase historical knowledge and research concerning the Sámi. Together with other research infrastructures and memory organizations the Sámi Archives runs different projects and advances accessibility of the archival materials through organizing, describing, and digitizing them. Source materials relate to Sámi society, history, languages, and culture which can be used in many different fields of study as well as in genealogy and artistic work.
The Sámi Archives was founded in 2012 and it is part of the National Archives of Finland. It gets its funding from the national budget. Sámi Archives is located in Inari at the Sámi culture centre Sajos, on the shores of the river Juutua and Lake Inari. Sámi Archives has received many private archive donations and the National Archives of Finland has also repatriated materials from the archives of Oulu and Helsinki to Inari. The most notable of these is the Archive of the Skolt Sámi village of Suonjel (Gramota), which made it to UNESCO’s Memory of the World Register in 2015. This unique and immeasurably valuable collection of documents deals with the fishing, hunting and reindeer herding rights for the traditional lands of the Skolt Sámi.
Homepage: www.kansallisarkisto.fi/samiarchives (opens in a new window)
Inker-Anni Linkola-Aikio
Project Manager, Senior Research Officer
inker-anni.linkola-aikio@kansallisarkisto.fi
Ájtte (Swedish Mountain and Sámi Museum) is the main museum of Sámi culture in Sweden and a special museum for the Mountain Region's nature and culture. It’s also an information centre. Through documentation, research, exhibitions, and publications the Ájtte museum presents Sámi culture from an ecological and holistic perspective. The museum operates across Sápmi in Sweden. Laponia was appointed a mixed heritage site on UNESCO’s list of the World Heritage Sites in 1996 and is an important field of work for the Ájtte museum.
The Ájtte museum has approx. 10 000 cultural-historical objects in their collections and has great expertise in Sámi material culture. The museum also documents and collects contemporary duodji and has several exhibitions on duodji and costumes. Ája, the museum archive and library, has archive collections, digital material, recordings and currently approx. 100,000 digitized and searchable photographs.
Within the framework of the AIDA project, a new form of personal archives was established at the Ájtte museum: the duojárs and artists' archives. They contain materials such as sketches, notes, and letters, photographs, posters, promotional materials, and material samples as well as objects.
Homepage: www.ajtte.com/english (opens in a new window)
Anna Westman Kuhmunen
Project Leader, Curator
Sámi University of Applied Science (Sámi allaskuvla) is a Sámi higher education and research institution founded in 1989 in Kautokeino, Norway. For a long time, the Sámi wished for higher education in the Sámi language in Sámi environment. Finally, a separate Sámi University of Applied Science made it possible to create a curriculum which better met the needs of the Sámi community. Sámi teaching and Sámi research has been both the foundation and the condition for the operation of Sámi University of Applied Science. Since the institution was founded, the curriculum and the activities at the Sámi University of Applied Science have been much expanded. The Sámi University of Applied Science has in this way taken part in amplifying the Sámi community. In the same period, Sámi research has had a great overall change and expanded, and in this development the Sámi University of Applied Science has played a central part together with other institutions.
The vision of the Sámi University of Applied Science is to become a Sámi University and a university for indigenous peoples, where the Sámi language is heard and written daily, and where Sámi and other indigenous values and thoughts are in the centre. School of higher education should help support and develop the Sámi communities, industries, language, and culture. The work must be based on the conditions and qualities that exist within Sámi society and culture.
Sámi allaskuvla is the only higher education institution that has duodji programs at bachelor's and master's level. The educations are based on research and development work within duodji at the university.
Homepage: www.samas.no (opens in a new window)
Gunvor Guttorm
Project Manager, Professor in Duodji
Sámi Archives
Inker-Anni Linkola-Aikio,
samiarkiiva@kansallisarkisto.fi
Sámi University of Applied Sciences
Gunvor Guttorm,
gunvor@samas.no
Ájtte, Swedish Mountain and Sámi Museum
Anna Westman Kuhmunen,
info@ajtte.com