Need and Misery in the Eastern Periphery: Nordic Sámi Media Debate on the Kola Sámi

ABSTRACT This article investigates Nordic Sámi discourse on the Kola (Russian) Sámi through analysis of texts from Sámi newspapers and journals 19922009. Among the findings are that that the relationship between Nordic and Kola Sámi is frequently discussed as a donor-recipient pattern similar to that of general Western discourse on the "global South" and the 1990s' "great misery discourse" on Russia. This portrayal of the Kola Sámi is here referred to as the "discourse of need". However, the study also finds that this most divergent subgroup of the Sámi people is accepted into the border-transcending Sámi nation without question. It is never challenged that they are part of a larger "us". The article also comments on some similarities between the "discourse on the Kola Sámi as a "suffering" group, and certain patterns in Nordic Sámi self-representation. In comparison, a selection of non-Sámi media texts displayed less interest in the Kola Sámi; their paying attention to the group was more dependent on its members being perceived as victims of crisis and/or injustice; and they articulated the discourse of need moren often. The two decades from which texts were drawn (1990s and 2000s) differed mainly by the latter period showing a general decrease in interest in the group; and by Sámi media being less dominated by the discourse of need, and containing more texts portraying the Kola Sámi as culturally and politically active.