About the Church of Sweden’s Performative Apology to the Sámi People
Dirk Gindt, Professor of Theatre Studies at Stockholm University, presents new research on The Church of Sweden’s Performative Apology to the Sámi People from 2021.
The article is published in the journal Scandinavian-Canadian Studies/Études Scandinaves au Canada and is available in open access online.
Grounded in performance theories and Indigenous methodologies, this essay focuses on the 2021 solemn service in Uppsala Cathedral, when the Church of Sweden apologized for its historical complicity in the colonization of Sápmi. The essay discusses key rhetorical features of the Archbishop’s apology and analyses how the service incorporated Sámi visual, material, oral, and performance cultures. Of specific interest are five Sámi testimonies about settler colonialism and artist Anders Sunna’s redesign of the sanctuary. To tease out the contextual specificities (and limitations) of the apology and situate it as part of unfolding decolonial processes across the circumpolar North, the essay draws selective comparisons to Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission and former Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s 2008 formal apology to First Nations, Inuit, and Métis Peoples.
Dirk Gindt is Professor of Theatre Studies at the Department of Culture and Aesthetics. His research attends to post-war and contemporary queer theatre and performance from an international and intercultural perspective. He is serving as Head of Research in Theatre Studies and as Director for the International Master's Programme in Performance Studies.
Circumpolar Performance Cultures, financed by a four-year grant from the Swedish Research Council, analyses the history and decolonial labour of contemporary Sámi performance in the Swedish part of Sápmi. It is conducted in consultation and close dialogue with Giron Sámi Teáhter in Kiruna/Giron.
