The Dream Dimension: Beyond the Veil
Juliana Gagné exhibit at the Scandinavian Cultural Center
West Newtown, Massachusetts
January/February 2025
Note: This zine will center Indigenous naming conventions, the North American landmass will be called Turtle Island. The homeland of the Sámi people will be referred to as Sápmi. There is a bias in my selection of Sámi names, that bias being that they center the North Sámi language (Davvisámegiella) which while being the largest spoken Sámi language is far from the only Sámi language
Who am I?
I am Juliana Nelson Gagné, my Mother is Dr Liane Elisabeth Nelson. My maternal Grandfather was Dr Sherman Eddie Nelson. I was born in Boston, Massachusetts (native land) and I was raised primarily in Fairfield, Connecticut (Uncoway, native land). My Mother and Grandfather were raised in the Twin Cities of Minnesota (native land) and it was my Grandfather who first started to do his family genealogy.
Growing up my Grandfather spoke Norwegian and Swedish at home until his Father, Albert Wilhelm Nelson (Nilsson) died when he was five years old. The youngest of six children, my Grandfather was devastated by this loss as he had spent most of his time with his Father.
The day after his funeral, my Great-Grandmother, Dea Mathilde Tromsness, told her children, “starting today, only English will be spoken in this house”.
Growing up my Grandfather lived in St Paul in a Swedish ghetto (neighborhood where recent immigrants moved to) and his Mother started teaching him lies about his ancestry. She told my Grandfather, whose favorite brother was nicknamed
“Black Joe” for his dark coloring,
“when they ask you why you are so dark, tell them it is because we are part French”.
I don’t know where this claim came from, they were a family of immigrants from Scandinavia. My Grandfather decided to study psychology so he could “begin to understand his own family” and was very interested in meditation and mindfulness, dreams and hypnosis. He famously with a friend opened a walk-in clinic in Minneapolis in the 1970s where people suffering from bad psychedelic trips could have a safe place to come down.
As a result of his genealogical research, my Grandfather became connected with the community of Sámi descendants in Minnesota. He told me once that he thought his Mother might have never been told that her family had been Sámi, instead she thought they were “second class Norwegians”. He had been taught to have shame about his ancestors, and he did not want to pass this willful ignorance or shame onto the next generations. My Grandfather learned as much as he could about Sámi history, culture and literature. He started to collect CDs of joiks from Sápmi and in the 1980s my Grandparents visited so-called Norway and Sweden and met with family. During my last conversation on the phone with my Grandfather,
he told me that the first time he went to Sápmi, he felt that he had finally come home.
I have been published in Báiki International Sámi Journal.
I have also had imposter syndrome, in its myriad forms. As much as I appreciate and respect Sámi history, art and culture I question my own nebulous ties to this culture. I have never been to Sápmi, I didn’t grow up in a Sámi village or speak a Sámegiella as a first (or even second) language. I don’t have the lived experience to speak for the Sámi people. My only connection is detached descent from generations of people who left. Not all of my ancestors were Sámi, and many lines that were had been assimilated to varying degrees. But I think even if I can’t claim being Sámi that there is an importance in knowing the truth of my family and how they lived.
I have so much pride that my Grandfather taught me, for the intelligence and resilience of my ancestors who were Sámi. I don’t want to claim anything that isn’t mine or appropriate a culture that I haven’t lived in. I wanted to speak for my own family stories and I was generously helped by community members for telling me the stories as they knew of their Sámi ancestors and how they came to be in Turtle Island.
Among the descendants in Turtle Island of Sámi people that I know, I hear again and again the pain at disconnection and loss of cultural heritage. There is a longing for any connection to be weaved again.
“We, Saami are on people, united in our own culture, language and history, living in areas which, since time immemorial and up to historical times, we alone inhabited and utilized”
-Saami Political Program 1986, Saami Council Statements
Between 1820 and 1920, 2.1 million immigrants left from Scandinavia bound for Turtle Island (North America)
An unknown number of those immigrants were Sámi
Today there are estimated to be between 30,000-60,000 of their descendants, about half are believed to have no knowledge of their Sámi ancestors.
Who are the Sámi people?
The Sámi (also spelled: Sami, Saami, Same) are the only recognized Indigenous people in Europe. Today there are about 80,000 Sámi people living in Sápmi.
“The Sámi people have lived in their settlements long before the national borders were established” -Sámi Parliament, About the Parliament
Where are the Sámi homelands?
Sápmi (also spelled: Sabme, Samiland) is the ancestral land of the Sámi people, which today encompasses the invading countries of: Norway, Sweden, Finland the Kola Peninsula in Russia. Historically Sápmi stretched much farther south than it does today as a result of colonization and assimilation practices enforced by the occupying governments.
What are the Sámi languages?
Northern Sápmi
Northern Sámi (definitely endangered)
Lule Sámi (severely endangered)
Pite Sámi (critically endangered)
Southern Sápmi
Southern Sámi (severely endangered)
Ume Sámi (critically endangered)
Eastern Sápmi
Skolt Sámi (severely endangered)
Kildin Sámi (severely endangered)
Inari Sámi (severely endangered)
Ter Sámi (critically endangered)
Akkala Sámi (extinct)
North American Sámi Reawakening
In the 1980s a movement began to reclaim Sámi identity and history among the descendants of Turtle Island, including finding community, learning about shared history and culture and connecting with relatives back in Sápmi. Two publications are closely linked to this movement, the Báiki journal (1991) and Árran, a newsletter (1996).
For a timeline of the Sámi reawakening in Turtle Island:
samiculturalcenter.org/awakening/sami-reawakening-history/
In March 9-11, 1995 Nils Aslak Valkeapää visited Turtle Island for the last time, on that Friday he shared a joik and his incredible poetry in Minneapolis, MN. Saturday he visited Faith Fields house and visited with the community. That evening at Nathan Muus’ house there was a large feast held in his honor. My Grandfather, Sherm, met Nils Aslak during this trip, getting a signed copy of Trekways of the Winds which I inherited in 2012. This book is my most prized possession and I credit this book with connecting me and further interesting me in Sámi culture, history, art, poetry and music. I had grown up with Nils Aslan’s joiks but the visual art in the book had a huge influence on my own burgeoning art practice.
Turtle Island Sámi Immigration and Identity
The Sámi people who arrived int he larger migrations from Scandinavia and Finland often tried (and succeeded) to blend into the dominant Scandinavian and Nordic immigrant societies. The traditional languages, nature-based spiritual traditions and their identity as Sámi people were lost or purposefully hidden, destined to become obscured family secrets.
When people would migrate from Scandinavia or Finland, the ships recorded nationality, not ethnicity. The first recorded Sámi immigration to the US was in the 1860s in the Keweenaw Peninsula (Michigan) to work in copper mines.
Areas with High Amounts of Sámi Immigration include:
Minnesota, North Dakota, Iowa, Wisconsin, the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, Illinois, California, Washington, Utah, Alaska, Saskatchewan, Manitoba, Northern Ontario, Northwest Territories, Yukon and Nunavut
Laestadianism is Christian sect closely tied to the Sámi people because of Lars Levi Laestadius who preached primarily to Sámi populations. Its spread in the Americas is largely attributed to Sámi immigrants forming their own religious communities. The first congregation was founded as early as the 1870s.
The US Government hired reindeer herding families form 1894-1898 to teach the Alaska Native Inupiaq and Yup’ik people reindeer husbandry as they were initially facing starvation as a result of the colonial whaling industries in the Bering Sea and Chukchi Sea. The immigration to Alaska was the most well recorded Sámi immigration to the US.
When the Klondike Gold Rush started there was an even greater need for food and more Sámi reindeer herders and their families were recruited. The trip took three months and typically had 2-3 year contracts. Although many left once their contract expired, some families stayed in Alaska where they remain today.
Some of these Sámi immigrants who stayed in the US resettled in the midwest and Washington where there were large Scandinavian communities. In 1937 the Reindeer Act passed in Alaska which banned all non-Native Alaskans from having reindeer. Many Alaskan Sámi that were not married into these populations had to sell their reindeer at $3 a head to the government. After this, many people left Alaska and scattered across Turtle Island, including primarily to the Kitsap peninsula in Washington.
There is an exhibit The Sami Reindeer People of Alaska that has been on view in different locations since 2004.
The popular children’s movie Balto even has a Sámi connection, Samuel Balto was a Sámi explorer who moved temporarily to Alaska.
In writing a letter to a friend, he stated “…We came to Alaska July 27, 1898…we travelled seven miles upriver where we built seven houses and a big three story farmhouse…Up to the time when we started building, we received, according to our contract, ‘good and sufficient’ food. In November the Superintendent began to sell our provisions to the Eskimos and he put the money in his own pocket. For us [Sámi] there was less and less each month. Finally there was hunger among us and many came down with scurvy. Now we are all free men, having left government service.”
Samuel Balto died in 1921 in Sápmi and in Alaska a sled dog was named, Balto, in his honor. This dog became famous for the 1925 serum run to Nome to combat a diphtheria outbreak among the local children. Togo was the dog who ran the majority of the way, owned by Leonhard Seppala, a Norwegian-Kven dog musher. Balto completed the last leg of the serum run and dogs and mushers alike became national heroes.
What does it mean to be Indigenous? What is the difference between ‘Indigenous’ and ‘native’?
Indigenous people inhabited an area before it was colonized, they remain after colonization and are now a minority group.
Native loosely means the first people in an area, or can colloquially refer to where someone is from/was born.
International Labour Organization’s “Indigenous and Tribal Peoples Convention” of 1989 (ILO 169) defines being Indigenous as “peoples in independent countries who are regarded as indigenous on account of their descent from the populations which inhabited the country, or a geographical region to which the country belongs, at the time of conquest or colonization or the establishment of present state boundaries and who, irrespective of their legal status, retain some or all of their own social, economic, cultural and political institutions”
Being Indigenous is not about having a match on a DNA test, it is about your connection and ties to the living community
Descendants in Turtle Island are even more disconnected from their ancestors, but some descendants have traveled to Sápmi and have met with their Sámi kin
Green Colonialism
Green colonialism refers to “clean energy” projects like solar power or wind turbines, which are used as a tool of modern day colonization by putting the projects on sovereign Indigenous land without the consent of communities and elders
Fake Saami: The Particular Case of Finland
The Sámi people are without a doubt Indigenous to Sápmi, which present day includes occupied Norway, Sweden, Finland and Russia. As such, the UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples of 2007 clarifies that, “Indigenous peoples have the right to self-determination. By virtue of that right they freely determine their political status and free pursue their economic, social and cultural development…States in consultation and cooperation with indigenous peoples, shall take the appropriate measures, including legislative measures, to achieve the ends of this Declaration”
Here is where Finland violates the law, by not allowing Sámi people to determine who is and is not Sámi, and thus who can and cannot vote on Sámi issues.
As descendants in Turtle Island we have to be careful to remember our place and be aware of the harm that can come from claiming a culture that your family no longer has a living tie to. Claiming Sámi ancestry or identity is not a neutral act, especially when that claim comes with territory claims. There is a fine line to walk between being proud of your ancestors and coopting a culture that you do not have a lived experience in. Our voices should be used to amplify the people within the Sámi community and to spread awareness of the ongoing colonization of Sápmi and the destruction of the land.
Whose Land is the Scandinavian Cultural Center on?
native-land.ca
Nipmuc
Donate: https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=R3Z7GRCKY4P9A
Palestine: From the Rind to the Seed
The occupation of Palestine since 1948 has always been a colonial project, cleverly disguised as an edict from God and a religious right. A saying that has been making its rounds on social media says, “Every colonized person sees themself in Palestine. Every colonizer sees themself in Israel”
For the Sámi people the position on Palestine is clear, cut and dry. The Sámi Council has made a statement in support of Palestine
https://www.saamicouncil.net/news-archive/statement-from-the-saami-council-a-free-palestine
It’s not just a theoretical solidarity however, as Israeli companies seek to colonize Sápmi with their energy projects.
The following three poems are excerpts from the poetry and art book I have been writing with my Aunt, Shannon Nelson-Deighan
REINDEER, AGAIN
Shannon Nelson-Deighan
I am reading a novel on reindeer mutilation. Metaphor
for Sami and their way of life. Stupid Lapps, literal
translation.
Here in America they discover you
through DNA markers. Then there are the Sami
scholars who say there are no such markers.
In the novel
a bloody reindeer hangs over the festival fence,
& the heroine skis to get rid of her hate/fear/hate,
the reindeer means: her relatives & her. Hiss
of snow.
In the end snowmobiles herd the calves
that have survived being cut from their mothers.
Have survived. In the end
my ancestors came to America
unlearned the language, wanted to make money,
had to make money, had to forget. Maybe
that’s why I am no longer welcome
in the midnight sun. No gakti, no four winds hat,
it’s like wearing an Indian headdress, it’s like wearing blackface.
No place for ancestor hunger except learn the language
that was unlearned
in the middle of Minnesota
by my ancestors. Something to be learned
in that midnight sun where I stand, disobedient
as always.
Juliana Nilsson Gagné
Reindeer Lichen
From Sápmi to Minnesota to Cape Cod
moss and lichen creep in thick velveteen
carpets in the forest
running through veins of sand carved
by glaciers of millennia past
the reindeer lichen grows so far
away from the reindeer herds of my ancestors
even across the ocean from the mountains
of my progenitors, from their fishing rods
spun delicately by the light of the midnight
sun, I find the food for their reindeer,
the ghostly herds multiply in another world
where grazing pastures are always green
and snow falls soft and deep in the forest
and I think of all that is lost
when the drums are burned,
the joiks banned
I think of all that is lost when
an Indigenous family is forced to assimilate
when they instead, choose to run
from their homeland
put an ocean between them
and the bones of their ancestors
and the bones of their spectral reindeer herds
Linnea pauses on a page in Áillohaš’s book,
points to an ancient drawing of a reindeer,
boazu, I hold the word in my mouth
like a pebble, feeling its cool, smooth edges
run flat by centuries of rushing blue glacial water
Grandpa grew up not speaking English
his voice gently accented by the old country
he was taught to swallow shame like medicine
to spew fables by the spoonful about his heritage
and cross himself with lies
your Mother’s voice was deeply accented
the shame of being somehow strange
ran through her blood
left her quiet,
thoughts unsaid
once Mom said she would cry if
she heard me speaking English,
a native speaker, no accent,
so that day I decided
to learn Norwegian so Dea Mathilde
could speak through me when she wanted,
I learned Davvisámegiella so when she
had something to say, she could say
it in the language of her ancestors
your Pa brought you everywhere
with him, a raven-haired polyglot
he could speak in the native tongue
of every farm he visited,
every windmill needing a repair
but he left you far too young,
still just a boy needing his Father
once you told me in your deepest state
of meditation you nestled by the river
and felt your Father wrap his arms around you,
felt him rocking you
like a child once again
Áddja you studied psychology so you could
begin to understand your own family
their complicated ways,
the heavy quiet, your anxiety,
the rugs always needed to be squared
to the wooden floor you would scrub clean
you were complicated yourself, Áddja,
Father of Them All
your first wife Joyce, you were so young
when you decided to save her from her family-
made a family of your own
then you met Denise, your whip-smart
beautiful Nevada-born psychology student-
and your patient first, if it weren’t for you
she would have been killed by Charles,
her first husband, who loved to wrap
his meaty hands around her neck until
her vision went black
well Denise was complicated too,
struggled to raise four of Joyce’s kids
while bringing up her own,
pushed aside her ambitions for her family
but promised her daughters would never
leave school for a man
she told us we had to be good
at math and science to show
the boys that we were just as smart,
smarter still
Áddja you told me once that
I didn’t need a tattoo
to know who I was, and to remember
where my family came from,
but with every needle
slicing into the delicate meat of my flesh
I thought of you
growing up so far away from Minnesota
I never felt like I fit in
went so long without meeting a Sámi
person we weren’t related to
longed for that culture, that community,
that connection
Linnea says we aren’t Sámi,
can’t claim it we don’t have a tie
to a living community,
she’s right-
but that can’t change our ancestors,
can’t change the pride Grandpa
taught me that ran embroidered in
red, blue, green and yellow wool
I trace the lines of the boazu
engraved on the cave walls of Alta
etched with chisels made of quartz crystal
the rocks around the drawings
were grown over with millennia
of moss and lichen creeping
its way over the landscape
covering it in a soft blanket
of green and white velvet
across a dark grey ocean,
even on the great plains
you still managed to find
reindeer lichen in the forest
of Minnesota, forming lazy
spirals around your favorite lake
where you fry up a freshly
caught bass for dinner and you
ate it by the gentle light
of a foreign midnight sun
THE SEARCH
Shannon Nelson-Deighan
I imagine my far North ancestors through reindeer dreams,
but I do not know the silent language of the lavvu.
A romantic might imagine the smoke rising, hear the crackle of the fire.
I can only imagine my ancestors.
I want to be truthful: I never imagined reindeer slaughter.
I imagined reindeer hooves and the stampede of snow
as the reindeer hauled the sun up from its winter darkness.
A romantic, I wanted to become one, to give the reindeer flying hooves.
I want to be truthful: I never imagined the fences of Finnmark.
I never imagined the hunger there, lichen and moss eaten to fence-line
where once reindeer moved in a slow rhythm across the fenceless land.
I read: time was Fall, Winter, Spring, Summer, not hours or a calendar.
I want to be truthful: I have lost my reindeer, my Boazu.
I have lost my ancestors. In America I don’t know my roots, my language.
In Sápmi, now, I am no one. I walk the fence-line of my ignorance.
Here, I walk beside, not as one, but wanting to be as one.
Quotes from the book “Liberating Sápmi" by Gabriel Kuhn
“The closest we come to official definitions of Sámi identity are the regulations for those eligible to vote for the Sámi parliaments. In Norway and Sweden, one needs to self-identify as a Sámi, and at least one grandparent must be a Sámi language speaker. In Finland, the regulations are similar, but there also exists an old Sámi population register. In Russia, there is no direct popular vote for the Sámi parliament, its members are delegated by Sámi organizations” (Kuhn 2)
“While self-identification and language are key criteria for the Sámi parliament definitions of whom to consider a Sámi, Swedish law includes another criterion, namely owning and herding reindeer. The latter is a requirement for membership in a sameby an economic association of reindeer herding families. While individual Sámi have no special rights in Sweden, samebyar do. In other words, the law divides the country’s Sámi into two classes. This has caused much strife within the Sámi community and continues to do so today” (Kuhn 3)
Further Resources:
Saami Council & Parliament:
Saami Council English link:
saamicouncil.net/en/home
Sámediggi: Sámi Parliament (enable Google Translate for English)
sametinget.no/about-the-sami-parliament/?sprak=12
Turtle-Island Based Sámi Groups:
Pacific Sámi Searvi: pacificsami.org
Sámi Cultural Center of North America: samiculturalcenter.org
(Located in Duluth, Minnesota)
Immigration History:
Wikipedia: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sámi-Americans
Ted Talks:
Sofia Jannok:
youtube.com/watch?v=5GZu8xECOdw
Movies:
Sameblod/Sámi Blood (Amazon Prime)
Stolen (Netflix)
Books & Journals:
Nils-Aslak Valkeapää/Áillohaš:
Trekways of the Wind (English translation)
Ædnan by Linnea Axelsson, available in Swedish and English
Stolen by Ann-Helén Laestadius
We Stopped Forgetting by Ellen Marie Jensen
Báiki International Sámi Journal:
samiculturalcenter.org/baiki-the-north-american-sami-journal/
Liberating Sápmi by Gabriel Kuhn
Art and Architecture:
Joar Nango:
archive.pinupmagazine.org/articles/interview-mimi-zeiger-joar-sami-architecture-joar-nango
Research and Academic Writing:
The website of academic Liisa-Rávná Finbog
https://liisaravna.blog/
Kofte & Duodji:
Lectures by Master Regalia Maker and Duojár: Anna-Stina Svakko
astudesign.com/
People/Groups to Follow on Social Media:
Instagram:
Individuals:
@mariboine
@beaskaniilas
@sofiajannok
@ellemarjaeira
@samistylebyelle
@joarnango
@samiskakocken
@Liisara
@maxidamarak
@elle.valkeapaa
@pisomby
Organizations:
@gruvfrittjokkmokk
@samediggi
@samekofter
@samesystrar
@sameradionochsvtsapmi
@sami.easter.festival
@ridduriddu
@nuoraidraddi
@nuoraidmagasiidna
@pacificsamisearvi
@samiskt_sprakcentrum
@samiskhus_oslo
Shopping/Design:
@sami_duodji
@samiduodji
@jokkmokkstenn
@duodjishop
@tromso.gift.and.souvenir.shop
@jokkmokksmarknad
TikTok:
@willamona
@ellemariehi
@samiskkurs
@samiskmusikarkiv
@samiskakocken
@slincraze
@dj_idja
@djailo
@saraelvira_k
@sarakvuolab
@idabenoni
Facebook Groups & Pages:
Sámi of America
Sami Sidda
Lær Samisk (Learn a Sámi Language)
Canadians with Sami Ancestry
Saami (Sámi) Genealogy
Sami Cultural Center of North America
Learn Northern Sami
Colour Your Past
Nipmuc Nation:
https://www.nipmucnation.org/history
Link to donate:
https://www.paypal.com/donate/?hosted_button_id=R3Z7GRCKY4P9A