Relations between Sámi and Western ways of sorting and organizing elements in a set

This paper describes three examples of Sámi mathematics. These examples, which are associated with different cultural contexts, show similarities to what Western mathematics calls 'combinatorics’. All examples are cultural practices that show descriptive use of mathematical knowledge. These are not mathematical problems and thus there is no need to find an exact number of possibilities. We describe the cultural practices by connecting them to Trinick, Meaney and Fairhall’s framework ‘Cultural symmetry’. Two of the practices, the Sámi braiding ruvden and the traditional reindeer ear marking, show how sorting and organizing items results in a variety of labels that provide further information. The third practice, the use of birccut in the Sámi board game Sáhkku, displays many possibilities for how a player could move the pieces and develop strategies. Based on our findings, we suggest that combinatorics is important for prospective Sámi mathematics curriculum