Southern Sami

The Southern Sami language, also known as Åarjelsaemien gïele and simply as Sami, is a language of the Sami people. It is spoken in parts of Norway, Sweden, Finland, and Russia. Southern Sami is written in the Latin script, and has about 2,000 speakers. The Sami languages are a group of related languages spoken by the Sami people in parts of northern Finland, Norway, Russia, and Sweden. The three Sami languages with the most speakers are Northern Sami, Inari Sami, and Skolt Sami. Southern Sami is the least-spoken of the Sami languages, with about 2,000 speakers. Southern Sami is most closely related to the other Sami languages, but is not mutually intelligible with them. It is more distantly related to the Finnic languages, such as Finnish and Estonian. The Southern Sami language has three dialects: Upper Sami, Lower Sami, and Pite Sami. Upper Sami is spoken in Sweden, Lower Sami is spoken in Norway, and Pite Sami is spoken in Sweden and Norway. The Sami languages are endangered, and Southern Sami is no exception. In recent years, however, there has been some effort to revive the language, and it is now taught in some schools in Norway and Sweden.