EMW Bookstore Information

EMW Community Space, fondly known as "EMW Bookstore,"​ is the community space of the 21st century, at the frontiers of creative place-making. Our team develops and delivers cross-disciplinary community programming and events while collaborating with like-minded partner organizations to expand our collective impact. EMW’s mission is to empower individuals and communities to realize their human potential through the transformative power of artistic expression. We provide innovative programming at the intersection of art, technology, and social justice. Our activities are rooted in values of sharing, trust, respect, and mutual support. Through innovative programming, we strive to expand the concept of family to our immediate community and the world. In 1998, the wife and husband team of Professors Wen Kong and Jin Au Kong opened the Chinese-language bookstore East Meets West. Envisioned as a space to empower the Chinese immigrant community through scholarship, East Meets West also shared the acronym of Professor JA Kong's research, electromagnetic wave theory, the study of energy that propagates throughout the universe. In 2004, their son David Sun Kong, renowned poet Giles Li, architecture student Theresa Hwang, and numerous other community organizers, revitalized the bookstore into a community space for the local Asian Pacific Islander American (APIA) community. East Meets West served as a hub of art and activism and the home of Boston Progress Arts Collective, which organized what is now the longest running APIA open mic on the east coast, East Meets Words. In 2011, David sought to expand the building's impact to include technology and other art forms, while staying true to the space's social justice roots. He recruited co-founders Monique Nguyen, Jack DeBoe, Abel Rey Cano, and along with core partner organizations, established EMW: Art | Technology | Community.