Educational Policy and Boarding Schools for Indigenous Sami Children in Norway from 1700 to the Present

Abstract

This chapter focuses on the boarding school system and the school policies toward the Sami people in Norway from 1700 to the present. The Norwegian government has confirmed that the Sami are the indigenous people in Norway. The Sami language belongs to the Finno-Ugric branch of the Uralic language family. Sami children grow up today in a society in which the Sami culture and language enjoy a completely different status from the society in which their parents grew up. The chapter also focuses on how the developments in this school system reflect changes in the views and policies of the national authorities. The chapter provides a presentation of the boarding school system and how it affected the lives and self-perceptions of Sami children. It provides information on Norwegian material, since the majority of Sami live there and offers some side glances to the other Nordic countries.