In addition to conducting oral histories, the archive also collects memorabilia such as photographs, newspapers, journals, business records as well as recipes and artworks.
And despite the setbacks, many of them actually are very reluctant to talk about any kind of discrimination is suffered, when clearly these 80, 90-year-olds grew up under Jim Crow, a worse and yet they did not want to talk about it.Each semester, ten to twenty Rice student interns join the HAAA internship program to receive oral history techniques training, conduct and transcribe interviews, as well as research and write on the materials they collect through this method of history studies, some of which are submitted for a Chao Center's student-run publication Rice Asian Studies Review (RASR).
In 2023, HAAA was given a grant by the Robert H. N. Ho Foundation to initiate an art x music residency program, with its inaugural artist-in-residency Liu Xin.
[8] In 2018, HAAA was the recipient of the Phi Beta Kappa society Award for Innovative Efforts to Build Community Connections through the Humanities.
[9][10] In 2017, HAAA was the recipient of the Resilient Networks to Support Inclusive Digital Humanities jump-start grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.