• Alain Locke on Identity and Human Rights

    Of Alain Locke,  Martin Luther King Jr. said: “We’re going to let our children know that the only philosophers that lived were not Plato and Aristotle, but W. E. B. Du Bois and Alain Locke came through the universe.” In this article we explore an idea in the work of Alain Locke – the idea that identity and oppression are related to each other.  That the pathway to emancipation is through re-imagining our identity.  Early on he explored these themes in the introduction he wrote to his 1925 anthology titled “The New Negro“. The tribute above, particularly from Martin Luther King, calls for greater attention to Alain Locke’s philosophy and…