Locke and Kallen, Student and Teacher

This chapter considers the fateful encounter between Alain Locke and Horace Kallen during an academic discussion. They had met the previous year, but this time Kallen was the teacher, and Locke his pupil. The chapter reveals how these conversations in an academic setting led to the development of the friendship between Kallen and Locke and, from that friendship, the idea of cultural pluralism. It shows that Kallen and Locke maintained their elitist sensibilities, but like so many American elitists before them, they believed in an aristocracy of “merit,” a purportedly objective standard. At Harvard, Kallen and Locke would first judge each other worthy of respect as individuals. The assistant system made that relationship possible. Eventually they would become friends.