Dinesh D'Souza, author of the recently published "The Enemy at Home: The Cultural Left and Its Responsibility for 9/11" and other books that have influenced public opinion and public policy since the early '90s, will lecture at Cornell College on Friday, May 11.

D'Souza will speak on "Islam, Christianity, and the War on Terror" at 11 a.m. in Kimmel Theatre of Youngker Hall. This is the inaugural lecture in Cornell's Roe Howard Freedom Lecture Series.

D'Souza has been called one of the "top young public-policy makers in the country" by Investor's Business Daily. The New York Times Magazine named him one of America's most influential conservative thinkers. The World Affairs Council lists him as one of the nation's 500 leading authorities on international issues. Newsweek cited him as one of the country's most prominent Asian Americans.

D'Souza is the Robert and Karen Rishwain Fellow at the Hoover Institution at Stanford University. Prior to that he was the John M. Olin Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute. In 1987-88 he served as senior policy analyst at the Reagan White House. From 1985 to 1987 he was managing editor of Policy Review. He graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Dartmouth College in 1983.

His books include New York Times bestsellers "What's So Great About America" (2002) and "Illiberal Education" (1991), which was the first study to publicize the phenomenon of political correctness. He's also written "Letters to a Young Conservative" (2003), "The Virtue of Prosperity: Finding Values in an Age of Techno Affluence" (2000), "Ronald Reagan: How an Ordinary Man Became an Extraordinary Leader" (1997) and "The End of Racism" (1995).

The lecture series is named for Roe Howard, a Mount Vernon native, 1917 Cornell graduate and recipient of the Distinguished Service Cross in World War I. He was killed in action in France in 1918. The lecture series is funded through the generosity of the Riesen Foundation and Cornell trustee and alumnus Dean Riesen and alumna Barbara Riesen.