Skolt Saami Dance: The Transformative Journey of Tradition, Resilience, and the Arctic Quadrille (Hardcover) (ISBN-13: 9781350249424)

This is the first book in English exploring the quadrille as danced among the Skolt Saami, one of the indigenous Saami peoples in Northern Europe.

The Skolt quadrille - the focus of this book - offers a fascinating case of transnational movement of dance forms, as well as insights on a living dance tradition in a specific indigenous culture. Today, the Skolts' quadrille is a social dance with six figures, and it is most often danced by four couples. The dance resembles quadrilles in northern Russia, but its historical roots are in the imperial French quadrille.

This book traces the history of the Skolt Saami through the lens of their dance and what is known of the Skolt quadrilles from historical sources. This is contrasted with contemporary narratives and practices, including interview materials with practitioners. The Skolt quadrille is examined as embodied action and as performance, taking place amid changing historical, social and cultural discourses. The book considers how the dance represents issues attached to the Skolt people's identity as a religious minority, both among the Finnish majority and the Saami; an evacuated community, living amid other Saami groups and Finns; and as Finnish citizens, most speaking Finnish as their first language.

Author: Petri Hoppu,Marko Jouste
ISBN-10: 1350249424
ISBN-13: 9781350249424
Publisher: Bloomsbury Academic
Language: English
Published: 02/19/2026
Pages: 216
Format: Hardcover
Weight: 1.07lbs
Size: 9.21h x 6.14w x 0.56d