Teaching Social Sustainability and About Sweden’s Sami Peoples in Senior Secondary School

Abstract

This chapter outlines an action research project conducted in a Social Studies classroom in a Senior Secondary School in South Sápmi, Sweden. The teacher researcher had noted that despite some of the students identifying as Sami, there was a lack of awareness about Sami history and culture, and that when Sami peoples were referred to it was often in discriminatory and derogatory terms. The unit of lessons aimed to increase the students’ knowledge of Sami life both historically and presently, and awareness of how prejudice and stereotyping are used to ‘other’ certain groups to justify exploitation and oppression. Using the ‘Educating yourself in Empowerment for Sustainability’ tool and designing leaner centred and collaborative activities this research found that when students’ knowledge of Sami life increases, their prejudicial ideas about Sami peoples decrease.