Christine Whyte's chapter The Strangest Problem, on Daniel Wilberforce and the 1912 Human Leopards panic in Sierra Leone, appears in Harald Fischer-Tine's edited volume Anxieties, Fear and Panic in Colonial Settings, published by Palgrave Macmillan in its Cambridge Imperial and Post-Colonial Studies series in 2016. Its authority rests on standard academic press peer review and on Whyte's specialist archival research into the colonial court records. It offers a modern historiographical reading of the panic as colonial anxiety rather than evidence of an actual leopard society conspiracy, a reading that stands in deliberate contrast to the contemporary colonial accounts it examines, so it is best read alongside, not instead of, the primary record it reassesses.
Facts
Assessment
Reliability Tier1
Christine Whyte's chapter on Daniel Wilberforce and the 1912 Human Leopards panic, in Harald Fischer-Tine's Palgrave Macmillan volume Anxieties, Fear and Panic in Colonial Settings, 2016, the top tier reflecting standard academic press peer review and Whyte's specialist archival research. It offers a modern historiographical reading of the panic as colonial anxiety, best read alongside, not instead of, the primary colonial accounts it examines. NotesModern historiographical reassessment reading the 1912 trials as colonial panic; the counter-reading to Beatty 1915.
Citation
AuthorChristine Whyte
Publisherin Harald Fischer-Tine (ed.), Anxieties, Fear and Panic in Colonial Settings, Palgrave Macmillan, Cambridge Imperial and Post-Colonial Studies Series
Publication Year2016
Source Typeacademic monograph
Claims Backed By This Source (12 claims)
This source backs 12 claims across the atlas. As facts: 9 well-attested, 1 scholarly debate. Plus 2 entities citing it as a general reference with no single fact or relationship attached.
Disposition By Topic
- Sources, 7 claims: 7 well-attested.
- Articles, 2 claims: 2 well-attested.
- Secret Societies, 2 claims: 1 scholarly debate, 1 general references.
- Countries, 1 claims: 1 general references.
Reader Challenges (0 open reader challenges)
No disputes yet. Spotted an error or a better source? Open the first one.
Sign in to dispute this or suggest a correction.
View At A Past Year
The atlas records no dated fact of its own for this entry, so there is no other year to choose.