Better addressing linguistic and cultural diversity in national library infrastructures can have a wide impact on society. Our infrastructures and services cater to many users, both individuals and organizations, extending beyond the library and cultural heritage sector. Here, the National Library of Finland shares experiences from newly initiated support for the Indigenous North Sámi language in some of its core services.

The National Library of Finland implemented a two-year project, Support for Sámi languages in digital services, to introduce North Sámi support in several national infrastructures. North Sámi is an endangered language spoken by the Indigenous Sámi who traditionally live in regions of Finland, Norway, Sweden and Russia. The project, supported by the Alfred Kordelin Foundation, will soon conclude with several outcomes.

The strategic guidelines of the NLF (2021–2030) highlight equal access to information and openness. National services are typically built around majority languages and cultures. Consequently, minorities often access them through a majority lens even when engaging with their own heritage.

The NLF recently published a North Sámi language version of the Finna.fi search service for cultural and scientific materials. North Sámi speakers can now use their language to search through millions of materials from hundreds of libraries, museums and archives. Cultural heritage organizations using the Finna platform for their own digital services can also adopt this new interface language.

Within the Finto.fi vocabulary service, the project has added North Sámi terms to the General Finnish Ontology (YSO), a multilingual controlled vocabulary used in Finland for indexing publications and other resources. Finto.fi is widely used by Finnish cultural heritage, media and public administration organizations. Currently, YSO contains more than 20,000 North Sámi terms. These are often curated in collaboration with the official Sámi language authority, Sámi Giellagáldu. By promoting the use of North Sámi, we are supporting the Sámi people’s cultural and linguistic autonomy and access to information, while increasing the online presence of North Sámi in public services.

During the project, the NLF established valuable collaboration with many Sámi organizations. When the NLF maintains the services in the future, these collaborations will remain crucial to ensure that the needs of the Sámi people are adequately recognized and addressed.

Author: IFLA National Libraries Section