"Sámiid Ædnan" was the Norwegian

Norway

Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...

 entry in the Eurovision Song Contest 1980

Eurovision Song Contest 1980

The Eurovision Song Contest 1980 was the 25th Eurovision Song Contest and was held on 19 April 1980 in The Hague. The presenter was Marlous Fluitsma, although each song was introduced by a presenter from the nation represented...

, performed by Sverre Kjelsberg

Sverre Kjelsberg

Sverre Kjelsberg in Tromsø) is a Norwegian singer, musician , composer and lyricist. He was a member of the band The Pussycats from 1964...

 and Mattis Hætta

Mattis Hætta

Mattis Hætta is a Norwegian singer of the region of Lapland and he is a Sami.In 1980, he and Sverre Kjelsberg won the Melodi Grand Prix 1980 with the entry Sámiid Ædnan and went on to represent Norway in the Eurovision Song Contest 1980.He has worked in pantomimes and yoiks in Alta, Kautokeino and...

. The song is sometimes described as being in the Sami language

Sami languages

Sami or Saami is a general name for a group of Uralic languages spoken by the Sami people in parts of northern Finland, Norway, Sweden and extreme northwestern Russia, in Northern Europe. Sami is frequently and erroneously believed to be a single language. Several names are used for the Sami...

, however this is not correct. The words of the song were performed in Norwegian

Norwegian language

Norwegian is a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Norway, where it is the official language. Together with Swedish and Danish, Norwegian forms a continuum of more or less mutually intelligible local and regional variants .These Scandinavian languages together with the Faroese language...

 by Sverre Kjelsberg, while Mattis Hætta contributed with yoik

Yoik

A joik, , luohti, vuolle, leu'dd, or juoiggus is a traditional Sami form of song.Originally, joik referred to only one of several Sami singing styles, but in English the word is often used to refer to all types of traditional Sami singing...

 - a Sami form of vocal music without words; the title of the song is however in one of the North-Norwegian Sami dialect

Dialect

The term dialect is used in two distinct ways, even by linguists. One usage refers to a variety of a language that is a characteristic of a particular group of the language's speakers. The term is applied most often to regional speech patterns, but a dialect may also be defined by other factors,...

s, translating as "Sami Earth" or "Sami Soil".

The song is inspired by the autonomy movement among the Sami people

Sami people

The Sami people, also spelled Sámi, or Saami, are the arctic indigenous people inhabiting Sápmi, which today encompasses parts of far northern Sweden, Norway, Finland, the Kola Peninsula of Russia, and the border area between south and middle Sweden and Norway. The Sámi are Europe’s northernmost...

 of northern Norway, with the duo singing that the demand for autonomy was made in a very subdued manner. Mention is also made of the traditional music of the region, the yoik, which is described as being "stronger than gunpowder" in the lyrics. The line "framførr tinget der dem satt, hørtes joiken dag og natt" (in front of the parliament where they sat, the yoik was heard day and night), refers to a hunger strike by Sami activists in front of the Norwegian parliament building in connection with the Alta controversy

Alta controversy

The Alta controversy refers to a political controversy in Norway in the late 1970s and early 1980s concerning the construction of a hydroelectric power plant in the Alta river in Finnmark, Northern Norway.-Key events:...

 shortly before.

The song was performed eleventh on the night, following Finland

Finland

Finland , officially the Republic of Finland, is a Nordic country situated in the Fennoscandian region of Northern Europe. It is bordered by Sweden in the west, Norway in the north and Russia in the east, while Estonia lies to its south across the Gulf of Finland.Around 5.4 million people reside...

's Vesa-Matti Loiri

Vesa-Matti Loiri

Vesa-Matti "Vesku" Loiri is a Finnish actor, musician and comedian, best known for his role as Uuno Turhapuro, whom he portrayed in a total of 20 movies between the years 1973 and 2004....

 with "Huilumies

Huilumies

"Huilumies" was the Finnish entry in the Eurovision Song Contest 1980, performed in Finnish by Vesa-Matti Loiri. The song was composed by Aarno Raninen, who also had composed 1977 entry "Lapponia"...

" and preceding Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

's Katja Ebstein

Katja Ebstein

Karin Witkiewicz, also known as Katja Ebstein, is a German singer. She was born in Girlachsdorf . She achieved success with songs such as Theater or Es war einmal ein Jäger. She was married to Christian Bruhn, who wrote many of her songs. She represented Germany at the Eurovision Song Contest...

 with "Theater

Theater (song)

"Theater" was the German entry in the Eurovision Song Contest 1980, performed in German by Katja Ebstein. This was Ebstein's third Eurovision entry, she had represented Germany in 1970 and 1971, with "Wunder gibt es immer wieder" and "Diese Welt" respectively, both times finishing in 3rd...

". At the close of voting, it had received 15 points, placing 16th in a field of 19.

It was succeeded as Norwegian representative

Norway in the Eurovision Song Contest

Norway has been participating in the Eurovision Song Contest since 1960 and only been absent twice: in 1970, when they boycotted the contest over disagreements about the voting structure, and in 2002, when they did not qualify....

 at the 1981 contest

Eurovision Song Contest 1981

The Eurovision Song Contest 1981 was the 26th Eurovision Song Contest and was held on 4 April 1981 at the Simmonscourt Pavilion of the Royal Dublin Society in Dublin. The presenter was Doireann Ní Bhriain...

 by Finn Kalvik

Finn Kalvik

Finn Bjørn Kalvik is a Norwegian singer and composer.-Early career:He was born in Fåvang, but his family moved to the working class district of Grorud, Oslo in 1952. Early in his career Kalvik found success putting music to the poetry of popular Norwegian writers André Bjerke and Inger Hagerup...

 with "Aldri i livet

Aldri I Livet

"Aldri i livet" was the Norwegian entry in the Eurovision Song Contest 1981, performed in Norwegian by Finn Kalvik.The song is a ballad, with Kalvik telling his lover that "Never in my life have I thought of leaving you", and asking whether she thinks of him when he is not with her.The song was...

".

An excerpt from the song is seen being sung by the characters in the trailer for the 2011 movie prequel

Prequel

A prequel is a work that supplements a previously completed one, and has an earlier time setting.The widely recognized term was a 20th-century neologism, and a portmanteau from pre- and sequel...

 The Thing

The Thing (2011 film)

The Thing is a 2011 science fiction horror film directed by Matthijs van Heijningen Jr., and written by Eric Heisserer. It is a prequel to the 1982 film of the same name by John Carpenter, the plot taking place immediately prior to the events of that film...

.