This master's thesis examines the tabori (1868–1871), mass Slovenian national assemblies, from the perspective of sound history and the broader interdisciplinary field of sound studies. Based on a philosophical analysis of the concepts of sound, voice, music, noise, and silence, as well as the broader historiographical context of the Slovenian tabori, the thesis offers a sound-informed interpretation of primary sources. Through the analysis of journalistic sources, memoirs, and personal correspondence, it reconstructs the concrete soundscapes of the tabori and the opposing constitutional days, as well as more abstract and metaphorical sonorities in the press. It captures the diverse perspectives that emerge when the tabori are viewed as sonic events, for example: the influence of space on affective atmosphere, the significance of crowd reactions to the uniqueness of a speaker's voice, silence as a marker of political maturity, and the similarities between the sonorities of nationalists and their opponents. The research seeks to illuminate that nations are, besides “imagined communities,” also “communities of emotion,” and that national sentiments often arise from sensory – and thus also auditory – experiences.
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