The Sámi People: Traditions in Transition. By Veli-Pekka Lehtola. (Translated by Linna Weber Muller-Wille, Aanaar-Inari: Kustannus-Puntsi, 2002. Pp. 136, ill., ISBN 952-5343-11-1.)

Among the relatively small number of English language monographs on the culture of the Sámi people of northern Scandinavia, this book is not only the most up-to-date, but also admirable for its interpretation of history, contemporary social issues, and cultural achievements from a Sámi perspective. This book is a substantial update of the Finnish language edition, Saamelaiset — Historia, Yhteiskunta, Taide [The Saami — History, Society, Art], published in 1997. A significant aspect of the update is its dedication to the memory of cultural icon, writer, and musician Nils Aslak Valkeappa, who died unexpectedly in 2001, and about whom the final chapter of the book is written. The rapid mythologizing of Valkeappa before and especially since his death is evident even in the slightly renuanced title with its future-oriented emphasis on “transition;” similarly, Valkeappa’s work is frequently cited for its emphasis on “bridge-building” and “border crossing,” metaphors that permeate the text. Lehtola emphasizes points of change, offering something like a Foucauldian geneaology of significant historical moments in order to demonstrate Sámi adaptability. He places a high value on creative work, referencing literature, art, music, theatre and film, as well as the media of newspapers and radio. Evidence of this is the integration of a rich array of images that constitute an intertext. The cover itself encapsulates important themes in the book, with an image of a Laestadian Sámi preacher, one of the Sámi flag in the context of an Alta River demonstration, and a piece of silver work by a contemporary artist. The book manages to balance the ongoing tension between the Sámi as one people, yet internally diverse and externally diversified by the varied socio-legal contexts of the four nations where they reside. The cultural distinctiveness as well as the threats to language and lifeways of various groups of Sámi, especially the more easterly groups including the Aanaar (Inari) Sámi, the Skolte Sámi, and the Kola peninsula Sámi, are recognized. The importance of transnational links both historically and in present alliances with, for instance, the World Council on Indigenous People is a theme that runs through the volume. The book has four chapters. The first, “Multifaceted Sámi” introduces the theme of diversity within, clarifying names and groupings and challenging the perception of all Sámi as reindeer herders. Lehtola describes lifeways and symbols of this diversity: clothing design and environmentally related language differences, in particular. He explains the stereotypes of the “primitive” that marked early Lappish literature by both Sámi and non-Sámi writers that was oriented to southerners. In “Milestones of Sámi History” the emphasis is on change and response to both natural crises and outside contact. This chapter challenges the stereotype of Sámi as a people in isolation by demonstrating social interactions at least as early as 2,000 B.C. Lehtola offers a remarkably clear picture of the numerous shifts in national borders, state interests in the north, and the consequent impact on the annual herders’ migrations as well as the social organization of the Sámi siida, defined as a “community of family groups who share and govern a jointly owned territory,” (88). The influence of missionization on the “mental landscape” of the Sámi is sensitively nuanced. Unlike some studies that have demonized the rigid tenets of Laestadians, Lehtola traces Laestadius’ Sámi roots and the influence of the ecstatic ?uorvvut movement on his church. The tensions over land rights and the Norwegianization policy that was most intense from 1870 to 1914, as well as the twentieth century political and cultural “awakening” of the Sámi are described succinctly but without reducing the complexity of divergent views. Chapter three, “Participants in …