(''anarâškielâ'') is a
Finno-Ugric ,
Sami Language spoken in
Finland by some 300-400 people, the majority of which are middle-aged or older and live in the municipality of
Inari . It is the only
Sami language that is spoken exclusively in Finland. The language is classified as being seriously endangered as few children learn the language.
The first book in Inari Sámi was ''Anar sämi kiela aapis kirje ja doctor Martti Lutherus Ucca katkismus'', which was written and translated by Edvard Wilhelm Borg in 1859. The written history of modern Inari Sámi, however, is said to begin with Lauri Arvid Itkonen's translation of the history of the
Bible in 1906, although he had already translated some other books into Inari Sámi before that (Martin Luther and John Charles Ryles). After that, Inari Sami was mainly published in books written by linguists, Frans Äimä and Erkki Itkonen, in particular. For many years, very little literature was written in Inari Sami, although
Sämitigge has funded and published a lot of books, etc., in recent years.
Since 1992, Finland's Sami have had the right to interact with officials in their own language in areas where they have traditionally lived: in
Enontekiö ,
Utsjoki ,
Inari and the northern part of
Sodankylä as official policy favors the conservation of the language. All announcements in
Inari , which is the only officially quadrilingual municipality in
Finland , must be made in
Finnish ,
North Sami , Inari Sami and
Skolt Sami . Only about 10% of the public servants in the area, however, can actually serve the Inari Saami-speaking population in Inari Saami, so
Finnish is used by the remaining 90%.
In 1986, the Anarâškielâ Servi (Inari Sámi Association) was founded in order to promote the language and its use. The association also publishes a lot of books, textbooks, a calendar, etc., in Inari Sami. They have also established a language immersion program in 1997 for 3-6-year-old children in a day care in
Inari and
Ivalo .
A new phenomenon has been the fact that Inari Sami is currently being used in rap songs by , 2007 (
Sami National Day ).
Inari Sámi is written using an extended version of the
Latin Alphabet . The alphabet currently used for Inari Sami was made official in 1996 and stands as follows:
A/a, (Â/â), B/b, C/c, Č/č, D/d, Đ/đ, E/e, F/f, G/g, H/h, I/i, J/j, K/k, L/l, M/m, N/n, O/o, P/p, R/r, S/s, Š/š, T/t, U/u, V/v, Y/y, Z/z, Ž/ž, Ä/ä, (Á/á).
The phonetic values are the same as in
Karelian , and đ represents the
Voiced Dental Fricative (in English "the"). Q/q, W/w, X/x, Å/å, Ö/ö are also used in words of foreign origin. Á is traditionally pronounced in the middle of /a/ and /ä/, but in modern Inari Sámi the difference between á and ä is nonexistent. In text, Á and ä are nevertheless considered as separate characters. Ä is used only, if
1) it is in a first syllable of a word, and there is an "e" or "i" in a second syllable of the same word,
2) it is in a word, which does have only one syllable (although á is also used), or
3) it is a part of diphthong "iä".
Ä however is not used, if it is supposed to be a part of diphthong "uá" (uá and uä are pronounced almost the same, but only uá is correct).
Inari Sámi has 9 cases, although the genitive and accusative are often the same:
The
Partitive appears to be a highly unproductive case in that it appears to only be used in the
Singular . In addition, unlike
Finnish , Inari Sámi does not make use of the partitive case for objects of transitive verbs. Thus "Mun puurâm leeibi" could translate into Finnish as either "Minä syön leivän" (
English : "I eat the bread") or "Minä syön leipää" ("I eat some bread" or generally "I eat bread").
The personal pronouns have three numbers - singular, plural and
Dual . The following table contains personal pronouns in the nominative and genitive/accusative cases.
The next table demonstrates the declension of a personal pronoun ''I/we (dual)/we (plural)'' in the various cases:
Inari Sami
Verb s conjugate for three
Grammatical Person s:
- first person
- second person
- third person
Inari Sami has 5
Grammatical Mood s:
Inari Sami
Verb s conjugate for three
Grammatical Number s:
Inari Sami has 2
Simple Tenses :
and 2
Compound Tenses :
Inari Sami, like Finnish, the other Sámi languages and Estonian, has a
Negative Verb . In Inari Sami, the negative verb conjugates according to
Mood (indicative, imperative and optative),
Person (1st, 2nd, 3rd) and
Number (singular, dual and plural).
Ind. pres. Imperatiiva Optatiiva
sg. du pl. sg. du pl. sg. du pl.
1 jie'm ián ep 1 - - 1 iällum iäl'loon iällup
2 jie'h eppee eppeđ 2 ele ellee elleđ 2 ele ellee elleđ
3 ij iä'vá iä 3 - - 3 iä'lus iällus iällus
- Itkonen, Erkki. ''Inarilappisches Wörterbuch.'' Lexica societatis fenno-ugricae: 20. Suomalais-ugrilainen seura. Helsinki. ISBN 951-9019-94-4.
- Sammallahti, Pekka. Morottaja, Matti. ''Säämi-suoma sänikirje. Inarinsaamelais-suomalainen sanakirja.'' Girjegiisá. Ykkösoffset Oy, Vaasa 1993. ISBN 951-8939-27-6.
- Olthuis, Marja-Liisa. ''Kielâoppâ.'' {Link without Title} : Sämitigge, 2000.
- Østmo, Kari. ''Sämikielâ vieres kiellân vuáðuškoovlâst.'' Helsinki : Valtion painatuskeskus, 1988.
