Johan Turi - An Account of the Sámi

Source: www.arkivverket.no

Johan Turi

Johan Turi  is a familiar name to most anyone who has heard stories or read about the Sámi. Sámi are the indigenous people who inhabitate the Arctic area of Sámpi, which today encompasses parts of the far north in Norway, Sweden, Finland, and the Kola Peninsula of Russia.

Source: www.arkivverket.no

Johan Turi (a.k.a. Johannes Olsen Thuri) was born in Kautokeino, Norway in March of 1854. Kautokeino is in the northernmost fylke (county) in Norway and shares a border with Finland. The community is straight north of Sweden.

Johan Turi was a wolf-hunter, a bear-hunter, an artist, and a bachelor with a dream. His dream was to publish a book that told the story of his people, the Sámi life. In 1908 this dream was about to come to fruition. He hand-wrote a manuscript into several bound notebooks. He included 14 hand-drawn illustrations. This all took place during a two-month stay in a hut at Duortnojávri; Torneträsk.

Emilie Demant Hatt, a Danish artist (and later ethnographer), encouraged Turi to write down his stories. She took these notebooks back to her home in Denmark, transcribed them, and translated them with the help of Anders Pederson and Vilheim Thomsen, two philologists.The final publication was an innovative bilingual edition written in both Danish and Sámi. This unique piece of literature was soon translated from Danish into German, English, and several other languages.

The year 2010 marked the one-hundredth anniversary of the first publication of Johan Turi's Muitalus samiid birra (An Account of the Sámi), the first secular book ever published in the Sámi language.

Turi's book is a classic of Sámi literature and cultural history. It provides fascinating insights into Sámi traditional practices, from reindeer husbandry to hunting and trapping, to childbirth, healing, courtship and song. Turi's account provides a unique glimpse of turn-of-the-twentieth-century Sámi life.

Now a direct translation from the Sámi language into English is available. Thomas A. DuBois, professor in the Department of Scandinavian Studies at the University of Wisconsin, reviewed the original notebooks written in Turi's handwriting, and translated them directly into English. Illustrated with examples of Turi's artwork, this new English translation has been published in a 221-page hardcover book, by ČálliidLágádus (authors' publisher), located in Deatnu/Tana, Norway.

Last week I wrote about the The Sámi-Americans of Poulsbo. In that post I mentioned meeting author Ellen Marie Jensen at the Poulsbo Historical Society (Tuesday, January 8, 2013). She was there to share this exquisite publication with the Poulsbo community. The story is well worth reading, and the black-and-white and color pictures are magnificent. Currently, the book can only be purchased from the publisher (for US $75).  I was able to purchase my copy of the book -- a valuable keepsake -- following Ms. Jensen's talk, however.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
For a sneak peek at what is contained within the pages of the new book, Johan Turi - An Account of the Sámi, I recommend this wonderful slide show. (It's all in Sámi, but the pictures are fabulous.)

Also of note:  Barbara Sjohoim, a Pacific Northwest author, has posted insights into the Johan Turi story on her blog Lapponia: a northern state of mind, including analysis of rumors about Johan Turi and Emilie Demant Hatt that have circulated over the years. Ms. Sjohoim is in the final stages of writing a book about Emilie Demant Hatt's life.  Titled With the Lapps in the High Mountains, it will be published in May 2013.

The Sámi-Americans of Poulsbo

Many of us who live in the Pacific Northwest are familiar with Kitsap County’s historic town of Poulsbo, Washington. Perched on the shore of Liberty Bay (once know as Dogfish Bay) with a population of just under 10,000, Poulsbo is known as "Little Norway on the Fjord."

Norwegians came to this area in the 1880s, drawn by water and mountain vistas that reminded them of their homeland, and abundant timber and fishing resources to support familiar industries they knew well.  Their first name for the community was “Paulsbo”, meaning Paul’s place, after a village in Norway.



Looking back at Poulsbo, Washington from Fjord Drive (Photo by Luci Baker Johnson)

In the mid to late 1890s, hundreds of Sámi immigrated to Alaska from northern Norway and Sweden. They were recruited by the US Department of Education and commissioned to teach the Inuit people of Alaska to herd reindeer. Many Sámi families lived and worked in Alaska until Congress passed the Reindeer Industry Act of 1937, which restricted ownership of reindeer in Alaska to the Inuit, and placed the management of reindeer herding under the Bureau of Indian Affairs.  After this, many Sámi left Alaska and settled in Poulsbo.

In her book “We Stopped Forgetting”: Stories from Sámi Americans, Ellen Marie Jensen shares firsthand accounts from the descendants of the Sámi who came to North America. She writes, “The title is intended to be a window into the ways that life stories reverse the process of assimilation through memory because assimilation depends greatly on forgetting. To stop forgetting is to remember the importance of all our cultural ancestors in our lived lives, which leads us to a better understanding of contemporary selves.” (p. 9).

What a novel concept!  



Ellen Marie Jensen (Photo by Luci Baker Johnson)

I had the privilege of meeting Ms. Jensen at an event sponsored by the Poulsbo Historical Society on Tuesday, January 8, 2013. (She was there to promote another book published by ČálliidLágádus, but that’s a story for a separate posting.)  I purchased a copy of her book, and have been reading it with fascination. Teacher, freelance writer and translator, Ms. Jensen was born and raised in Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota, but now lives and works in Deatnu/Tana, Norway. The book is an offshoot from her master’s thesis in Indigenous Studies at the University of Tromsø (2005). The Sámi-American experience is not widely known, and Ms. Jensen’s book provides valuable insight into it.

I encourage all to read her book, and learn more about this Pacific Northwest immigrant community. You can purchase a copy at the Liberty Bay Books in Poulsbo or directly from the author on her web site: We Stopped Forgetting.
___________________________________________

+ There is a big event at Pacific Lutheran University (PLU) this coming week: Sami People's Day, which is celebrated throughout Sápmi, the land of Indigenous Sámi in Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia. The celebration commemorates the first international, pan-Sámi organizational meeting held in Trondheim in 1917, making the beginning of the Sámi rights movement. There are several events that will take place at PLU on Wednesday, February 6, 2013.

+ If you find yourself near Decorah, Iowa between now and November 10, 2012, you must check out the exhibition:  The Sámi Reindeer People of Alaska.  The exhibition is sponsored by Owen and Naomi Bekkum, was coordinated by the Sami Cultural Center of North America and Báiki: the International Sami Journal. The exhibition includes enlarged historic photographs, poems and family stories, and duodji.

_________________________

Luci Baker Johnson