This chapter discusses how Sámi vocal genres can be interpreted in relation to traditionalcosmologies, in particular to the goddesses. The Sámi are recognized as an indigenous peopleliving in four countries (Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia). Such recognition is a result of theindigenous movement of the 1960s onward in which the revival of joik (a traditionalSámi vocal genre) was crucial in fostering a pan-Sámi indigenous sensibility. Althoughjoik continues to play a defining role in representing a pan-Sámi political identity, it isnot widespread across the region now known as Sápmi, the land of the Sámi (map 8.1).Among the Skolt Sámi in the eastern regions of Sápmi, the traditional vocal genre isthe leu'dd—often a narrative about an individual, which can beunderstood as a form of oral history. Leu'dd is regarded as a disappearing vocal tradition,in contrast to joik, which continues to be preserved, transformed, and recreated for moderncontexts.

Skolt Sámi have been forcibly relocated because of wars, Cold War military policy, andhydroelectric projects. Male singers have been killed by reindeer poachers, by alcohol abuse, or onmilitary frontlines. The most recent recording project, undertaken in the mid-1990s, focuses,therefore, on female singers, for whom the life histories narrated in leu'dd often involveexpressing distressing and overwhelming emotions. In discussing both joik and leu'dd toexplore gender, place, and constructions of pan-Sáminess, this chapter focuses on femalesingers, Sámi cosmologies, and Sámi feminist theorization.