Oral History in Practice: Celebrating Asian American Music + Memory

Join for a conversation between Voice of Witness community partnership manager Ela Banerjee and Rochelle Hoi-Yiu Kwan about storytelling, music, and empowering local communities to share stories.

Rochelle will share insights from Chinatown Records 華埠錄音, a homegrown community effort to celebrate the richness of music, oral history, and memory that comes with inherited family collections. From block parties to sonic family histories, Chinatown Records continues to grow as a community-powered, living archive. Rooted in deep listening and relationships, the project uses music as a familiar entrypoint and bridge for opening up conversation, sparking memories, and building connections across generations – starting at home with loved ones.

They’ll also dive into Rochelle’s work with Think!Chinatown, where she leads storytelling and neighborhood engagement projects, and Self Evident, a podcast that aims to improve Asian American representation in public radio. At Self Evident, she is the Community Producer and she leads their oral history training and archiving program. Self Evident works to build a home for the full range of Asian American perspectives so often erased from the national discourse. It offers a space to engage with reported stories, personal histories, and participatory local events — all by and about Asian Americans.