Neal was born in
Atlanta, Georgia, to Woodie and Maggie Neal, who had five sons. Neal's parents had a strong influence on his later works. His father had less than a high school education but was "exceptionally well-read" and his mother instilled in him a love of the arts. He graduated from
Roman Catholic High School in
Philadelphia in 1956. He later graduated from
Lincoln University (Pennsylvania) in 1961 with a degree in history and English, and then received a master's degree in 1963 from the
University of Pennsylvania in Folklore (which became a major subject of many of his later works). In 1963, Neal was a professor for
Drexel Institute of Technology in Philadelphia for a brief period, before landing a job in New York as a copywriter in 1964 for
Wiley and Sons. From 1968 to 1969, Neal taught at the
City College of New York. The following year he taught at
Wesleyan University, and then at
Yale University from 1970 to 1975. During his time at Yale, he won a
Guggenheim Fellowship for African-American critical studies. Neal is known for working with
Amiri Baraka to open the Black Arts Repertory Theatre/School. His early writings—including "The Negro in the Theatre" (1964), "Cultural Front" (1965), and "The Black Arts Movement" (1968)—were influential in defining and describing the role of the arts in the
Black Power era. Additionally, he became the arts editor of the
Liberator magazine (1964–69), educational director of the
Black Panther Party, and was a member of the
Revolutionary Action Movement. During this time, Neal became more involved in radical black politics and spent more time with Baraka and the Black Liberation movement (774). This work addressed the "Black aesthetic" and the need to reject a "white aesthetic", symbolically representing the essence of Neal's message as a leader in the Black Arts movement. At
Howard University in
Washington D.C., Neal held the Andrew W. Mellon Chair in humanities. During 1976–79, he was the Executive Director for the District of Columbia Commission on the Arts and Humanities. This organization helped with grants to further the arts in black communities. ==Family==