The Interreg Nord project Beavnardahke was cross-border cooperation between the two foundations Gaaltije in Östersund, Sweden, and Saemien Sijte in Snåsa, Norway. The project’s goal was to market and make Sami cultural environments and stories available with the help of modern technology.
The project has developed the website, www.baalka.se / www.baalka.no
The website presents a selection of Sami cultural environments from both the Norwegian and Swedish side of South-Saepmie, which you can visit to experience and learn more about Sami culture and history. You can find descriptions of older Sami cultural environments, which today can be observed as traces in nature. More in-depth information on topics such as reindeer, the Sami settlement and traditional Sami understanding of the world is also provided on the website.
It is important to spread knowledge about Sami culture and history to the surrounding majority society and to foreign tourists. The Sami culture is made visible and the understanding of the Sami culture increases. During the work in the project, the project partners have also learned a lot about what has worked well and what has worked less well. They have got new ideas for what can be done to increase the understanding of the Sami culture further and make it more visible, for example through new projects. A continuation of the project, Beavnardahke II with the goal to make Sami cultural environments from further parts of the South Sami area accessible, has started.
The project partners can see the added value of cross-border cooperation. Through cross-border cooperation, information exchange and exchange of ideas increases, and in addition, collaboration provides synergies, so that a good deal of extra work can be avoided. A cooperation like this, across borders, also helps to strengthen that it deals with the same people in two countries, which is especially important as the states most often talk about Norwegian and Swedish Sami, and in that way create an attitude that can work dividing on the Sami people.
Next to the website, www.baalka.se / www.baalka.no the work with Beavnardahke and the new ongoing project Beavnardahke II – Sámis on the Coast, is presented on Instagram, @beavnardahke_