Professor Wayne Lee

Professor Wayne Lee

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Experience

  • Distinguished Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2016 to Present
  • Chair, Curriculum in Peace, War, and Defense, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2009 to 2019
  • Harold K. Johnson Visiting Professor of Military History, U.S. Army War College, Carlisle, PA, 2015 to 2016
  • Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2011 to 2016
  • Associate Professor, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2006 to 2011
  • Assistant Professor, University of Louisville, 2000 to 2006
  • Visiting Assistant Professor, Duke University, 1999 to 2000

Education

  • PhD, History, Duke University, May 1999
  • BS, Computer Science and History, Cum Laude with Distinction in History, Duke University, May 1987

Awards

  • Harold K. Johnson Chair of Military History at the U.S. Army War College, 2015 to 2016 Academic Year
  • Winner, Society for American Archaeology, Scholarly Book of the Year, 2014
  • Co-Winner, Society for Military History, Distinguished Reference Book of the Year, 2007
  • Victor Olorunsola Award for Young Scholars, University of Louisville, 2001
Wayne E. Lee is the Dowd Distinguished Professor of History at the University of North Carolina, where he also chairs the Curriculum in Peace, War, and Defense. He is the author of Waging War: Conflict, Culture, and Innovation in World History (2016), Barbarians and Brothers: Anglo-American Warfare, 1500-1865 (2011), and Crowds and Soldiers in Revolutionary North Carolina (2001) as well as two edited volumes on world military history and many articles and book chapters.
 
Lee has an additional career as an archaeologist, having done field work in Greece, Albania, Hungary, Croatia, and Virginia, including co-directing two field projects. He was a principal author and a co-editor of Light and Shadow: Isolation and Interaction in the Shala Valley of Northern Albania, winner of the 2014 Society for American Archaeology's book award. In 2015-2016 academic year, Lee was the Harold K. Johnson Visiting Professor of Military History at the U.S. Army War College.

My Courses

War and National Security

by Professor Wayne Lee

$75.00
Why we love teaching history
Q: Why do you love teaching religion and politics?

A: I love teaching the history of religion and politics in America because there is no better way to shed light the confusing culture wars of our own time. Plus, this history lets us explore the spiritual practices and philosophies that different Americans have used to impose some kind of order on the chaos of life—and I think its our passion for ideas, for sweeping theories about good and evil and the meaning of existence, that make us human.
Professor Molly Worthen

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Q: Why do you love teaching national defense?

A: I am first and foremost a historian, but I also like for students to see how much the past is constantly influencing what we do in the present. This is true in many aspects of our past (and present), but it is often strikingly visible in national defense and security issues. In one sense, I’m using the students’ awareness of and interest in the present to awaken an interest in the past.
Professor Watne Lee

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill