Coming of Age

Alain Locke is the first to mention the words "coming of age" within this book, which is actually a series of essays, though many talk about the concept in different terms. In the case of Locke, he points out that the plight of the Negro has gained world-wide attention and that this attention has created some opportunities and responsibilities for the Negro. The ability and willingness to deal with this new responsibility requires a different kind of leader than that of ages past. A. Phillip Randolph uses the terms "New Crowd" and "Old Crowd" to define the leaders of today as opposed to those of years past, and goes so far as to generate a list of names of those no longer suited to leadership. Randolph isn't saying that these leaders haven't carried out their duties in their time, but that the world - and the...