The title is based on the Sámi expression “Birget”, which means coping and surviving in a changing environment. In “BIRGET; Ways to deal, ways to heal”, Elle Sofe Sara, Joar Nango, and Carte Blanche invite the audience to a healing bridge between silenced generations and institutional guilt.

In recent decades, several Western states have set up commissions to investigate the history of minority groups exposed to systematic state abuse. Examples of this include the apartheid regime in South Africa, the boarding school system in Canada, and the systematic oppression of the Sámi people and the Inuit in the Nordic States.

The question remains: How can sharing traumas and personal stories help create the empathetic space needed to rebuild friendly relationships with the faceless entity of the State?