ALAIN LEROY LOCKE

Locke (1886-1954) was born in Philadelphia, PA, to a distinguished family with a long history of education. He was elected Phi Beta Kappa and graduated magna cum laude from Harvard in 1907 with degrees in English and philosophy. He became the first African American to be named a Rhodes Scholar, and he studied philosophy, Greek, Latin, and literature. Afterwards he studied in Berlin and Paris. Upon his return to the States, he traveled in the South looking for jobs, and it was there was he was first exposed to the plight of most African Americans. He was appointed to a professorship at Howard University in 1912 and gave a series of lectures that racial temperaments are not due to biological factors, but instead to historical and social causes. In 1918 Locke became the first African American to receive a Ph.D. in Philosophy from Harvard University, and he returned to Howard University to chair the philosophy department. From this vista and with visits to Harlem, he urged blacks to use their own source material for their creative arts and not imitate or submit to white views of their superior position. After being fired from Howard by advocating a national African American theater of which the white president of the university did not approve, he began a campaign to promote black art and literature to all, including Europeans. He returned to Howard in 1928. From then until his retirement in 1953, he published essays and make black cultural expressions and integral part of education for all Americans.