Skolt Sami

Infobox Language
name=Skolt Sami
nativename= unicode|sääˊmǩiõll
region=Finland and Russia
speakers=~400
familycolor=Uralic
fam1=Uralic
fam2=Finno-Ugric
fam3=Finno-Permic
fam4=Finno-Volgaic
fam5=Finno-Lappic
fam6=Sami
fam7=Eastern
script=Latin alphabet
iso1=
iso2=sms
iso3=sms

Skolt Sami "(unicode|sääˊmǩiõll)" is a Finno-Ugric, Sami language spoken by approximately 400 speakers in Finland, mainly in Sevettijärvi, and approximately 20–30 speakers of the Njuõˊttjäuˊrr (Notozero) dialect in an area surrounding Lake Lovozero in Russia. Skolt Sami used to also be spoken on the Neiden area of Norway, although it has died out there. It is written using a Roman orthography that was made official in 1973.

History

Skolt Sámi was spoken in four villages on Finnish territory prior to the Second World War. In Petsamo, Skolt Sámi was spoken in Suonikylä and the village of Petsamo. This area was ceded to Russia in the Second World War, and the Skolts were evacuated to the villages of Inari, Sevettijärvi and Nellim in the Inari municipality.

tatus

Skolt Sami is spoken by approximately 400 individuals, nearly all of whom live in Finland; very few speakers remain today on the Russian side. On the Finnish side of the border, the language is recognized by the government as one of the official Sami languages used in Lapland and can thus be used by anyone conducting official business in that area. It is an official language in the municipality of Inari, and elementary schools there offer courses in the language, both for native speakers and for students learning it as a foreign language. Only a small number of youths do learn the language and continue to use it actively. Skolt Sami is thus a seriously endangered language, even more seriously than Inari Sami in the same municipality, which has a nearly equal number of speakers.

In 1993, language immersion programs for children younger than 7 were created. At present, however, no funding has been forthcoming for these programs in years and as a result they are on hold. These programs were extremely important in creating the youngest generation of Skolt Sami speakers.

Like Inari Sami, Skolt Sami has recently borne witness to a new phenomenon, namely it is being used in rock songssung by Tiina Sanila, who has published two full-length CDs in Skolt Sami to date.

In addition, 2005 saw the first time that it was possible to use Skolt Sámi in a Finnish matriculation examination, albeit as a foreign language.

Writing system

Skolt Sami uses the standard Latin alphabet with the addition of some special characters:

All diphthongs can occur as both long and short, although this is not indicated in spelling. Short diphthongs are distinguished from long ones by both length and stress placement: short diphthongs have a stressed second component, whereas long diphthongs have stress on the first component.

Consonants

The inventory of consonant phonemes is the following; their orthographic representations are given in brackets:

Verbs

Person

Skolt Sami verbs conjugate for four grammatical persons:

*first person
*second person
*third person
*fourth person, also called the indefinite person

Mood

Skolt Sami has 5 grammatical moods:

*indicative
*imperative ("Pueˊtted sõrgg domoi!" Come home soon!)
*conditional
*potential
*optative

Grammatical number

Skolt Sami verbs conjugate for three grammatical numbers:

*singular
*dual
*plural

Tense

Skolt Sami has 2 simple tenses:

*past ("Puõˊttem škoouˊle jåhtta.": I came to school yesterday.)
*non-past ("Evvan puätt mu årra täˊbbe". John is coming to my house today.)

and 2 compound tenses:

*perfect
*pluperfect

Verbal nouns

Skolt Sami verbs have 6 nominal forms:

*the infinitive
*the gerund
*the active participle (progressive)
*the abessive
*the present participle
*the past participle

Negative verb

Skolt Sami, like Finnish, the other Sámi languages and Estonian, has a negative verb. In Skolt Sami, the negative verb conjugates according to mood (indicative, imperative and optative), person (1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th) and number (singular, dual and plural).

Ind. pres. Imperative Optative sg. du/pl. sg. du/pl. sg. du/pl. 1 jiõm jeäˊp 1 - - 1 ? jeällap jim jep 2 jiõk jeäˊped 2 jieˊl jieˊlled 2 jieˊl jieˊlled jik jeˊped jeˊl jeˊlled jeˊl jeˊlled 3 ij jiâ, jeä, jie 3 - - 3 jeälas jeällaz 4 jeäˊt Note that "ij" + "leat" is usually written as "iˊlla", "iˊlleäkku", "iˊllää" or "iˊllä" and "ij" + "leat" is usually written as "jeäˊla" or "jeäˊlä".

Unlike the other Sami languages, Skolt Sami no longer has separate forms for the dual and plural of the negative verb and uses the plural forms for both instead.

References

*Korhonen, Mikko. Mosnikoff, Jouni. Sammallahti, Pekka. "Koltansaamen opas." Castreanumin toimitteita, Helsinki 1973.
*Mosnikoff, Jouni and Pekka Sammallahti. "Uˊcc sääm-lääˊdd unicode|sääˊnnǩeârjaž = Pieni koltansaame-suomi sanakirja". Jorgaleaddji 1988.
*Mosnikoff, Jouni and Pekka Sammallahti. "Suomi-koltansaame sanakirja = Lääˊdd-sääˊm unicode|sääˊnnǩeˊrjj". Ohcejohka : Girjegiisá 1991.
*Moshnikoff, Satu. "Muu vuõssmõs unicode|sääˊmǩeˊrjj" 1987.
* [http://www.finlex.fi/fi/laki/kaannokset/2003/en20031086.pdf Sámi Language Act]

External links

* [http://www.uta.fi/~km56049/same/skolt/koltansaame.html Kimberli Mäkäräinen] A very small Skolt Sámi - English vocabulary (<500 words)
* [http://www.idolphin.fi/sanastotietopankki/ Northern Sámi - Inari Sámi - Skolt Sámi - English dictionary] (requires a password nowadays)
* [http://www.kirjasto.oulu.fi/saamilottit/ Names of birds found in Sápmi in a number of languages, including Skolt Sámi and English. Search function only works with Finnish input though.]
* [http://www.siida.fi/saamjiellem/english/index.html Sääˊmjieˊllem] Sámi Museum site on the history of the Skolt Sámi in Finland
* [http://www.sfu.ca/~mcrobbie/Research1.html Zita McRobbie-Utasi] A number of linguistic articles on Skolt Sámi.
* [http://www.helsinki.fi/~sugl_smi/aani/Kielinaytteet/Koltansaame.mp3 Erkki Lumisalmi talks in Skolt Sámi] (mp3)