As journalists prepare to cover Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month in May, Rice University offers a unique resource rooted in the stories of one of the country’s most diverse cities.
The Houston Asian American Archive (HAAA) housed at Rice since 2009 is an expansive oral history project featuring the lives, struggles and contributions of Houston’s Asian and Asian American communities. The archive includes interviews, artifacts and memorabilia from more than 500 individuals, capturing the past and present of one of Texas’ fastest-growing populations. From family photographs and letters to restaurant menus and scholarship pageants, HAAA provides a deep well of content for reporters seeking to explore the complexity of Houston’s pan-Asian story.
The archive preserves the legacy of Albert Gee, a famed restaurateur who owned the iconic Poly-Asian restaurant, a 1960s hotspot frequented by celebrities and politicians. It also highlights Lakshmy Parameswaran, who founded Daya, a Houston-based South Asian women’s center, and Anhlan Nguyen, a Vietnamese refugee who survived 10 escape attempts before resettling in the U.S., where she now runs a nonprofit focused on banned literature.
“Over the years HAAA has become the go-to source for news media in and out of Houston on information about the AAPI community in greater Houston,” said Anne Chao, adjunct lecturer in the humanities and program director of the archive, who noted that journalists from outlets such as NPR, Voice of America, The New York Times, KHOU 11 and Houston Public Media have tapped into HAAA as a resource.
Beyond the archive, Rice is home to faculty experts linked to the Chao Center for Asian Studies and Department of Transnational Asian Studies whose research adds further context to the month’s themes of cultural identity, migration, religion and literature.
“Despite significant resistance, Texas has become one of the most diverse states in the country, and this diversity is among the state’s greatest strengths,” said Sidney Lu , the Annette and Hugh Gragg Associate Professor of Transnational Asian Studies. “Asian immigrants who have lived in Texas for over a century have substantially contributed to the state’s multicultural identity and economic prosperity.”
Lu mentored the student-led digital project “The History of Japanese Farmers in Texas” and teaches courses in Asian American history and Asian diasporas.
Eric Huntington, the T.T. and W.F. Chao Associate Professor of Transnational Asian Studies, brings a scholarly lens to the role of Buddhism in shaping cultural understanding across Asia.
“Buddhism has touched nearly every part of Asia and allows for understanding connections and differences between cultures that have spread worldwide,” Huntington said. “Focusing on everything from popular belief and practice to philosophy and fine arts, we can center different stories and recognize the innate richness of traditions and the people who carry them through history.”
As a former ethnic media editor and current scholar of Asian American and South Asian literatures, assistant professor of English Ragini Tharoor Srinivasan understands the stakes of representation in public discourse.
“Now more than ever, we must take stock of the tremendous material, cultural and social gains of AAPI communities in the U.S., while remaining vigilant about attacks on minority discourses and knowledges, attentive to the heterogeneity within AAPI communities and committed to building coalitions with other ethnic and racialized groups,” Srinivasan said.
Jaymin Kim, the T.T. and W.F. Chao Assistant Professor of Transnational Asian Studies, examines interstate relations and borderlands in early modern Asia. His research on the Qing empire (1636-1912) adds historical context to today’s conversations about China’s place in the world, suggests alternative ways of understanding sovereignty and borders and highlights the relationship between law and migration.
For more information or to arrange an interview with Rice experts, contact media relations specialist Brandi Smith at brandi.smith@rice.edu, or Chris Stipes, executive director of news and media relations, at chris.stipes@rice.edu.