Friday, January 28, 2005

Jan. 28, 2005

Wilmington, N.C. – In conjunction with the University of North Carolina Wilmington’s Homecoming weekend, two lectures will be held from 10:30 to 11:30 a.m., Saturday, Feb. 5 in Leutze Hall on the campus of UNCW.

“14 Steps to Starting a New Business” will be presented by Stephen Harper in Leutze Hall, Room 111. It will focus on the steps of starting a new business with particular attention directed to identifying and evaluating opportunities.

“The Middle East in the Life-Span of UNCW” will be presented by Lisa L. Pollard in Leutze Hall, Room 110. As a 58-year old institution, UNCW is older than most of the independent Middle Eastern nations. Using the life span of UNCW (formerly Wilmington College) as its framework, this lecture will consider what UNCW’s first graduates would have known about the Middle East and its potential for conflict. It will illustrate how issues facing the Middle East have changed since 1947 and how they have stayed the same.

Harper is the Progress Energy/Betty Cameron Distinguished Professor of Entrepreneurship in the Cameron School of Business and the author of five books on leadership and entrepreneurship. The McGraw-Hill Guide to Starting Your Own Business is a national best seller. Harper’s latest book, Extraordinary Entrepreneurship: The Professional’s Guide to Starting an Exceptional Enterprise, was published last month.

Pollard is an associate professor of history and co-coordinator of UNCW’s minor in Middle East Studies. During the fall semester she was a visiting scholar at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, University of California at Berkeley, where she continued her research on various 19th-century interpretations of the Islamic Mahdist movement and uprising in the Sudan (1881-1885). Pollard’s book, Nurturing the Nation: The Family Politics of Modernizing, Colonizing and Liberating Egypt (1805-1923) was published by UC Press this year.

The lectures are sponsored by UNCW’s Division for Public Service and Continuing Studies.