Distinguished in 1907 as the first African American Rhodes Scholar, Locke became known as the philosophical architect—the acknowledged "Dean"—of the Harlem Renaissance.

[5] In 1907, Locke graduated from Harvard University with degrees in English and philosophy; he was honored as a member of Phi Beta Kappa society and recipient of the Bowdoin prize.

Several American Rhodes Scholars from the South refused to live in the same college or attend events with Locke.

Alongside his friend and fellow student Pixley ka Isaka Seme, he was part of the Oxford Cosmopolitan Club, contributing to its first publication.

Locke wrote from Oxford in 1910 that the "primary aim and obligation" of a Rhodes Scholar "is to acquire at Oxford and abroad generally a liberal education, and to continue subsequently the Rhodes mission [of international understanding] throughout life and in his own country.

Among his prominent former students is actor Ossie Davis, who said that Locke encouraged him to go to Harlem because of his interest in theatre.

The library resources built up by Dorothy B. Porter to support these studies included materials which he donated from his travels and contacts.

[16] In December of that year, he expanded the issue into The New Negro, a collection of writings by him and other African Americans, which would become one of his best-known works.

A landmark in black literature (later acclaimed as the "first national book" of African America),[17] it was an instant success.

Although in the past the laws regarding equality had been ignored without consequence by white America, Locke's philosophical idea of The New Negro allowed for fair treatment.

While his own writing was sophisticated philosophy, and therefore not popularly accessible, he mentored other writers in the movement who would become more broadly known, such as Zora Neale Hurston.

[19] One author whose work Locke edited for both Survey Graphic as well as The New Negro was art collector, critic, and theorist Albert Barnes.

[20] Locke argued for the primacy of craft objects and the visual tradition as being the greatest contributor of black art to the American canon.

Due to the lack of an official enrollment system for the religion, the date when Locke converted to that faith is unverified.

When ʻAbdu'l-Bahá died in 1921, Locke enjoyed a close relationship with Shoghi Effendi, then head of the Baháʼí Faith.

Shoghi Effendi is reported to have said to Locke, "People as you, Mr. Gregory, Dr. Esslemont and some other dear souls are as rare as diamond.

[24] Locke was homosexual, and may have encouraged and supported other gay African Americans who were part of the Harlem Renaissance.

After Fauset died in 1983, and the remains were given to his friend, Reverend Sadie Mitchell, who ministered at African Episcopal Church of St. Thomas in Philadelphia.

[7] Howard University officials initially considered having Locke's ashes buried in a niche at Locke Hall on the Howard campus, as the ashes of Langston Hughes had been interred in 1991 at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture in New York City.

)[7] University officials eventually decided to bury Alain Locke's remains at historic Congressional Cemetery in Washington, DC.

In the center of these four symbols is an Art Deco representation of an African woman's face set against the rays of the sun.

This image is a simplified version of the bookplate that Harlem Renaissance painter Aaron Douglas designed for Locke.

He regularly published reviews of poetry and literature by African Americans in journals such as Opportunity and Phylon.