Hello! I am so sorry if this is not the place to bring this up, but I am an American who is curious about reconnecting. I have found out that my great grandfather’s family was south saami from the Stjørdal area. I unfortunately do not have any living relatives left in that area, nor do I have any here in the US who have a connection to the culture (assimilation kind of ruined that). Does anyone have any advice on how to learn the South Sámi language, joik, and possibly looking into gapta(though I understand this may not be possible as to my knowledge it is usually made by family members and passes down family history). Thank you:)
Bures!
Definitely not the wrong place to ask, but I’m afraid I might not be super helpful. This is what I managed to find.
There are some online resources for learning South Sámi:
uTalk, which seems to offer a course in South Sámi for English speakers, but you have to pay a subscription fee.
Govlelgem is an online resource that with sound recordings and exercises (that are linked to a course book with the same name, so I’m not sure if the book is required?). It’s in Swedish, though.
Sámediggi has an online dictionary where you can translate between South Sámi and Swedish.
As for gapta, I feel like a good starting point is following @samekofter on instagram. They post a bunch of pictures of different traditional Sámi clothing and they always write which area they originate from. I feel like it might give you a sense of what a South Sámi gapta looks like “in general”. When it comes to family specific details, it’s definitely harder to find unless you have living relatives who know or old photographs to examine.
As for joik, I found this website: The Way of the Yoik. They seem to have three different courses on joiking and one of them is free, so that might be a good start.
If anyone has any good tips on South Sámi resources, feel free to reply!
E-skuvla offers an online course in South Saami for English speakers.
Anna-Stina Svakko is a duojár with expertise in helping reconnecting Saami reclaim their traditional clothing. If you reach out to her with information about your great-grandfather and his family, she might be able to help you figure out what your gapta should look like.
