Nation-building and colonialism: The early Skolt Sami research of Väinö Tanner

Abstract

In 1929, the geologist Väinö Tanner (1881–1948) published an extensive study in human geography on the economic and social adaptation of the Skolt Sami. Tanner aimed at an understanding and respectful approach, and today he enjoys the reputation of a culturally sensitive scholar: one who tried to see the Skolt Sami culture from within, and who wrote against the most aggressive discourses of his time. There are indications, however, that the relationship between Tanner and the Sami was more complex than previously assumed. His book is examined in the light of recent theorizing on colonial knowledge production, revealing aspects of his relation to the object of study that can be seen as colonialist. The focus in the article is on Tanner’s approach to the hierarchization of the study object, and whether it was primarily the national or the colonial context, and the related discourses, that induced him to write about the Skolt Sami as he did. His unfavorable comparisons of the Skolt Sami to modern societies, and his use of an expert voice in relation to “correct” forms of subsistence, reveal a scholar deeply embedded in colonial discourses, as does his occasional direct praise of colonial politics. The national, however, turns out to be a more constitutive context for Tanner. Colonialism can be seen as too inclusive a super-structure, containing evolutionary and nationalist discourses articulated at the national level as well, but perhaps lacking the explanatory potential offered by the more apparent national context.