"A second crop of the Negro's gifts promises still more largely. He now becomes a conscious contributor and lays aside the status of a beneficiary and ward for that of a collaborator and participant in American civilization. The great social gain in this is the releasing of our talented group from the arid fields of controversy and debate to the productive fields of creative expression. The especially cultural recognition they win should in turn prove the key to that revaluation of the Negro which must precede or accompany any considerable further betterment of race relationships. But whatever the general effect, the present generation will have added the motives of self-expression and spiritual development to the old and still unfinished task of making material headway and progress. No one who understandingly faces the situation with its substantial accomplishment or views the new scene with its still more abundant promise can be entirely without hope. And certainly, if in our lifetime the Negro should not be able to celebrate his full initiation into American democracy, he can at least, on the warrant of these things, celebrate the attainment of a significant and satisfying new phase of group development, and with it a spiritual Coming of Age."

We know: this passage has a lot of words. So allow us to translate it into Shmoopese. Locke is basically saying that the (New) Negro has all these talents which can be put to good use. But not in that slavery/exploitation-type way.

Nope, this time around, black people are going to be equal players in this game we call American democracy. And this new democracy is not going to be all about capitalism, either. It's going to be about making art, music, culture—all that stuff that falls under the term "self-expression."

This new cultural and spiritual movement will totally show off the awesomeness of the New Negro. All of which is vital to creating a more equal society for black Americans.

It's a new era. No more slavery—blacks are free and employed. Everything's all hunky-dory, right? Eh, not exactly.

The Black American can still become a "conscious contributor," someone who is a "collaborator and participant in American civilization." To do that, she has to be able to express herself through art, music, literature—all that stuff that makes for a new culture and spirit.

Okay, let's stop right there and examine what Locke is suggesting more closely. Here, we think he's implying that when "the Negro" was enslaved, he wasn't a "conscious" participant. And in order to be fully "conscious," black people have to create a new cultural and spiritual movement.

That's a pretty controversial notion, if you think about it. Why? Well, it's almost like Locke is saying that slaves were never fully human. Black people weren't able to produce art or be truly self-aware under such a brutal, unjust system.

Now, on the one hand, Locke has a point. Slavery was extremely dehumanizing. And it wasn't like slaves had a whole lot of time to sit around and create art or literature, especially since illiteracy was kind of the rule (and law) of the day.

But that doesn't mean that black people weren't "conscious" then, does it? Is creating culture the only way to be "conscious"? We're guessing that some of those freed slaves would like to have a word with Locke.

We're not trying to say that Locke isn't putting some important ideas on the table here, What he does do, even if it means promoting the idea of the un-conscious slave, is to highlight the importance of culture and spirituality in the creation of the "New Negro."

He's telling us that the world needs more than just black accountants, doctors, and lawyers. He's arguing, rather, that the fine arts are fundamental to our being. And so black people must leave a cultural impact on the world (especially the white world) in order to really take down racism.

Black participation in the arts, Locke believed, would promote the "revaluation" of African Americans—it would cause (white) people to see them in a new light. The image of the New Negro would be one of intellectualism and cultural prowess, though that image would also necessarily pay homage to people's experiences of slavery and their African heritage.

Locke was all about empowering African Americans to take control of the way people imagined the "Negro." Which is a pretty powerful message, even if you don't agree with all of what the dude wrote.

"Conscious contributor"; "revaluation of the Negro"; "the motives of self-expression and spiritual development"; "still unfinished task of making material headway and progress"; "new phase of group development." Those are a lot of big, dense phrases, aren't they?

If this passage makes you feel like you're reading some dry, philosophical essay—or worse, a description of a new housing complex ("new phase of group development")—we sympathize. You'd think a manifesto-style essay like this one would be full of passionate rhetoric, fiery words and phrases. But Locke just isn't that kind of writer.

In fact, you might think of Locke as following in the writerly footsteps of another pair of manifesto writers: Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. No, we're not kidding. Locke's prose style bears a striking resemblance to the Communist Manifesto and other Marxist documents of that time.

Take the words "material," "phase," "development," "progress, "value," and "revaluation"—these words are all part and parcel of Marxist rhetoric. Locke clearly wants to allude to the idea that people's economic conditions, which are closely intertwined with the production of our society's technologies, are crucial to the way a society functions.

We're not going to get into how Marxism works right here, but it's important to note that Locke is letting his readers know where he got his ideas from. The "New Negro" has some serious Marxist philosophical roots.