Tuesday, November 12, 2024

Forest Finns

  

"The first probable historical mention of the Sámi, naming them Fenni, was by Tacitus, about AD 98.

 Variants of Finn or Fenni were in wide use in ancient times, judging from the names Fenni and Φίννοι (Phinnoi) in classical Roman and Greek works. Finn (or variants, such as skridfinn, 'skiing Finn') was the name originally used by Norse speakers (and their proto-Norse speaking ancestors) to refer to the Sámi, as attested in the Icelandic Eddas and Norse sagas (11th to 14th centuries). 





The etymology is somewhat uncertain, but the consensus seems to be that it is related to Old Norse finna, from proto-Germanic *finþanan ('to find'), 

 the logic being that the Sámi, as hunter-gatherers "found" their food, rather than grew it. 

 This etymology has superseded older speculations that the word might be related to fen. 

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'The Swedish government has allowed the world's largest onshore wind farm to be built in Piteå, in the Arctic region where the Eastern Kikkejaure village has its winter reindeer pastures.  

The wind farm will consist of more than 1,000 wind turbines and an extensive road infrastructure, which means that the feasibility of using the area for winter grazing in practice is impossible.  

Sweden has received strong international criticism, including by the UN Racial Discrimination Committee and the Human Rights Committee, that Sweden violates Sámi landrättigheter (land rights), including by not regulating industry. 

 In Norway some Sámi politicians (for example—Aili Keskitalo) suggest giving the Sámi Parliament a special veto right on planned mining projects.


Government authorities and NATO have built bombing-practice ranges in Sámi areas in northern Norway and Sweden. 

 These regions have served as reindeer calving and summer grounds for thousands of years, and contain many ancient Sámi sacred sites 


The Sámi recently stopped a water-prospecting venture that threatened to turn an ancient sacred site and natural spring called Suttesaja into a large-scale water-bottling plant for the world market 

—without notification or consultation with the local Sámi people, who make up 70 percent of the population. 

 The Finnish National Board of Antiquities has registered the area as a heritage site of cultural and historical significance, and the stream itself is part of the Deatnu/Tana watershed,  

which is home to Europe's largest salmon river,  

an important source of Sámi livelihood 

 




Reindeer have major cultural and economic significance for Indigenous peoples of the North. The human-ecological systems in the North, like reindeer pastoralism, are sensitive to change, perhaps more than in virtually any other region of the globe, due in part to the variability of the Arctic climate and ecosystem and the characteristic ways of life of Indigenous Arctic peoples.[75]


The 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster caused nuclear fallout in the sensitive Arctic ecosystems and poisoned fish, meat[76] and berries. 

 Lichens and mosses are two of the main forms of vegetation in the Arctic and are highly susceptible to airborne pollutants and heavy metals. Since many do not have roots, they absorb nutrients, and toxic compounds, through their leaves. The lichens accumulated airborne radiation, and 73,000 reindeer had to be killed as "unfit" for human consumption in Sweden alone. The government promised Sámi indemnification, which was not acted upon by government. 


In Finland, where Sámi children, like all Finnish children, are entitled to day care and language instruction in their own language, the Finnish government has denied funding for these rights in most of the country, including in Rovaniemi, the largest municipality in Finnish Lapland. 

P Sámi activists have pushed for nationwide application of these basic rights. 

The city of Rovaniemi offers day care and preschool education in the Sámi language, and then as basic education first as supplementary native language education starting from the first grade and as a voluntary subject on its own starting from the fourth grade. 



As in the other countries claiming sovereignty over Sámi lands, Sámi activists' efforts in Finland in the 20th century achieved limited government recognition of the Sámis' rights as a recognized minority, but the Finnish government has maintained its legally enforced premise that  

the Sámi must prove their land ownership, an idea incompatible with and antithetical to the traditional reindeer-herding Sámi way of life.  

This has effectively allowed the Finnish government to take without compensation, motivated by economic gain, land occupied by the Sámi for centuries. 

 Non-Sámi Finns began to move to Lapland in the 1550s" 


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"Norway apologises to Sami, Forest Finns and Kvens for forced assimilation policy

Parliament votes to express ‘deepest regret’ over more than a century of ‘Norwegianisation’ of minorities" 


"The forced assimilation policy – which included state-run boarding schools that banned minority languages and the forced relocation of whole villages – pursued by Norwegian authorities dated back to the 18th century and became official policy from 1851. Although parts were phased out in the 1960s, much of the policy continued into the 1980s." 


"While the apology, she added, “ensures long-term follow-up” with financial and legal accountability, 

 it was unfortunate no settlement had been made on continuing injustice and disputes over land and water.


She also hoped that the Kvens and Forest Finns, who she said have been subjected to “great injustice” would  

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/nov/12/norway-apologises-to-sami-forest-finns-and-kvens-for-forced-assimilation-policy“experience repair in the future”. 


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And 


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"Iran seized the Tunbs by force on Britain’s departure, claiming they had been part of the Persian empire since the 6th century BC. Lesser Tunb is only 1 sq mile and, according to the CIA, only populated by poisonous snakes." 


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"Frank Auerbach,  

the artist who arrived in Britain as a Jewish refugee fleeing Hitler’s Germany and went on to become one of the most significant figurative painters of the postwar era,  

has died aged 93."


"Over a career spanning seven decades, the British-German artist was known for his portraiture, as well as street scenes of Camden Town in north London where he kept the same studio for 50 years.  

He was also known for the unique way in which he created his work – repeatedly scraping the paint from versions he was dissatisfied with and starting again until the finished work could be so laden with paint that it threatened to wobble off the canvas."


"He once estimated that 95% of his paint ended up in the bin. “


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