The Touristic Construction of the "Emblematic" Sámi 1

Making Differences in a Changing World: The Norwegian Sámi in the Tourist Industry

“…Reindeer, traditional Sá mi clothes, folklore and other more or less emblematic ethnic signs of the Sá mi are what a large part of the annual 400,000 to 500,000 tourists in the area identify as Sá mi (Lyngnes & Viken, 1998). Compared with the more carefully made souvenir shops further south or other places in Finnmark, the shacks along the road have an advantage; they blur the distinction between front-stage and back-stage -in the field of tourist research a very famous dichotomy (MacCannell, 1976;Olsen, 2002Olsen, , 2003. In fact, some places one might see the tents or mobile homes of the reindeer herders just behind the shack and the animals might graze in the area.…”

“…To my knowledge these brochures made up the total of tourist brochures covering the area made by public or public funded actors. In their visual representation of the Sá mi they do not differ much from brochures made by national and international commercial companies, but they usually provide a more nuanced written account on the Sá mi (Olsen, 2003).…”

“…Norwegian Sá mi are a part of modern Norwegian society, usually most emphasized in brochures from public authorities, but still making strong references to a traditional culture (Olsen, 2003). Turning to the visual communication in the regional and local brochures the exotic difference is much more prominent.…”

“…Both these processes have constituted and marked the Sá mi as a group in contrast to and both legally and culturally distinct from the modern Norwegians. By this the Sá mi not only invested a distinct culture in contrast to the Norwegian; they also belong to a different conceptual category; labelled aboriginal, ethnic, indigenous, or traditional, that is constructed as a contrast to the modernity where Norwegian society and culture ostensibly belong (Olsen 2002(Olsen , 2003.…”

“…Tourism is obviously one out of several fields that perpetuate such ideas of disparity (Olsen, 2000(Olsen, , 2003(Olsen, , 2004. As an integral part of modernity tourism itself is based upon ideas of differences in modern Western thought (MacCannell, 1976).…”