Carl-Gösta Ojala

Carl-Gösta Ojala

Researcher in archaeology, Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University

Carl-Gösta (C-G) is a researcher in archaeology at the Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University, Sweden. His main research interests include Sámi history and archaeology, Russian and Soviet history and archaeology, as well as issues of heritage, identity, politics and research ethics. 

His Ph.D. dissertation Sámi prehistories: The politics of archaeology and identity in northernmost Europe (2009) discusses Sámi prehistory and archaeology, issues of Sámi heritage management, including questions about Sámi cultural rights and debates on repatriation of Sámi cultural heritage and reburial of Sámi human remains. 

C-G is currently working with research focusing on the early modern colonial history in Sápmi (the Sámi areas in Norway, Sweden, Finland and the Kola Peninsula in Russia), and early modern exploitation of natural resources, industrialization and missionary activities in Sápmi. He is also involved in research dealing with the collecting of Sámi material culture in the 17th and 18th centuries and its importance today, including issues of cultural rights, revitalization, management of museum collections and repatriation. 

In his research, C-G is also interested in exploring comparative perspectives on histories of archaeology and concepts of ethnicity, nationalism and indigeneity in the Nordic countries and Russia and the Soviet Union.