Iraida Vinogradova


Iraida Vladimirovna Vinogradova  was a Soviet and Russian Sámi poet who wrote in both Kildin and Ter Sámi, singer of Sámi songs, a scholar of the Ter Sámi language, and a member of the Kola Sámi Association .

Early life and education

Iraida Vladimirovna Matryokhina was born on March 10, 1936 in the village of Chalmny-Varre, Murmansk Okrug, USSR, one of six children born into the reindeer herding family of Klavdiya Grigoryevna Matryohkina and Vladimir Mikhailovich Matryokhin. Her mother was from a Sámi family of hunters and her father was Russian, from a family of Orthodox priests from Lovozero. Her sisters Oktyabrina and Tamara are famous in their own right: Oktyabrina Voronova is also a famous Ter Sámi poet and Tamara is the linguist T. V. Matryokhina.
Vinogradova graduated from the Department of the Peoples of the North in the A. I. Herzen Leningrad State Pedagogical Institute. After graduating, she worked as a teacher in the villages of Zelenoborsky, Monchegorsk, and Olenegorsk.
Vinogradova has written poetry for children, both in Russian and in Kildin Sámi. In addition to her poetry, she was involved in creating Sámi-Russian and Russian-Sámi dictionaries.