Please note the change of date due to strike action.
An IASH Work-in-Progress seminar, delivered by Dr Erika De Vivo (Postdoctoral Fellow 2022-23; Università degli Studi di Torino).
Sámegiella lea Márkomeanu váibmogiella
Linguistic artivism at the Márka-Sami festival Márkomeannu
In Sámi contexts, art has become an emancipatory tool against hegemonic narratives and colonial attitudes while also proving to be a powerful instrument in defying power asymmetries within Sámi cultures.
The Márka-Sámi festival Márkomeannu (Skánik/Skånland, Norwegian side of Sápmi) has been an exceptional site of Sámi artistic creativity and experimentation becoming a venue for ethno-political artivism, as epitomized by the Márkomeannu-2010 site-specific art project Lihkahusak or the 2017 linguistic project Giellabargit 2.0: Kurssas Duohtavuhtii. Both projects constitute instances of linguistic activism counteracting stigmatization and reversing the centuries-long language shift from Sámi to hegemonic Nation-State languages. A homage to local Sámi language and culture, Lihkahusak was also a highly visual and provocative form of linguistic protest against local attitudes opposing (Márka-)Sámi language and culture. The 2017 Giellabargit 2.0 project aimed at encouraging the use of the local Sami language in daily interactions. The then-Márkomeannu festival CEO posted on Facebook a picture where the Márka-Sámi word Čávva was highly visible on the staff’s sweaters. The caption read: Sámegiella lea Márkomeanu váibmogiella / Sámisk er Márkomeannus hjertespråk [Sámi is Márkomeannu’s language of the heart]. This was only one of the numerous bilingual texts posted online by the Márkomeannu staff since the festival was founded in 1999. Each post, each picture holds a strong symbolic value which can be fully grasped only when addressed in light of the local history.
A diachronic analysis of Márkomeannu’s virtual and on-site linguistic landscape offers insights into the entwinement of interdependent processes such as heritagization practices beyond museums and bottom-up activism counteracting toponymic silencing and language shift. I argue that Lihkahusak and Giellabargit 2.0 contributed to making Márkomeannu festival an arena where politically engaged cultural-linguistic artivism is negotiated, engaged with, and performed by both the local and the wider Sámi community.
Click the link below to join the webinar:
https://ed-ac-uk.zoom.us/j/86535202023
Passcode: Vr8f3ew2