Supporting Sámi Identity? Representations of the Sámi People in the Sámi Museum Siida

In this paper I will discuss the representations of the Sámi people in the main exhibition in Siida, Sámi Museum and Northern Lapland Nature Center that was inaugurated in 1998. The culture part of the exhibition presents Sámi culture and contributes for its part the construction of the Sámi nation, Sámi identity and what is a real Sámi. Main sources for this study are the texts, photographs and items presented in the Siida main exhibition and the archive material connected to the workgroup responsible for the planning and producing the exhibition. As an exhibition is a visible form of the choices made between contested and competing representations and interpretations of a culture, I’ll discuss the representations constructed in the exhibition by objects, photographs and texts. In addition I have interviewed different Sámi groups about their ideas, preferences and inclinations what a Sámi museum should have in its main exhibition, how the Sámis should be represented and whether they could identify with the Sámi representations in the exhibition. According to the Siida main exhibition work group one of the aims of the exhibition is to support Sámi identity. In Finland, the majority of the Sámi people have always had other that reindeerherding as their sole source of living. By presenting Sámi people dominantly as reindeer herding males or as figures from pre-war era, Siida exhibition excludes most of the Sámis in Finland from its definition who is a Sámi and what is Sámi culture. Keywords: Sámi people, museums, exhibitions, indigenous peoples, identity