Emma Marie Chiang is an independent filmmaker and photographer and proud San Francisco native. She is currently a full-time graduate student earning her Doctorate of Acupuncture and Chinese Medicine at The American College of Traditional Chinese Medicine (ACTCM) at the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS) in San Francisco California. Her expected graduation is in Summer 2023. Emma is a student clinician under licensed supervision at ACTCM community clinic in San Francisco.

As a freelance storyteller, Emma focuses on documenting stories of displaced communities and cares about the rights of marginalized people. She believes storytelling has the power to plant seeds of curiosity, dialogue, inclusion, reconciliation, and hope between individuals and communities.

In 2018 Emma completed a two-year-long documentary project called Coming Home: The 990 Pacific Relocation Story, in partnership the nonprofit, Chinatown Community Development Center (CCDC) capturing the stories of Chinatown public housing residents through a building renovation. She has also produced a series of short stories of San Francisco and Bay Area residents in her column, San Francisco Explored.

She received her B.A. in photojournalism and minor in Holistic Health at San Francisco State University, Spring 2016. She has interned at the San Francisco Business Times, San Francisco Examiner, SF Weekly and participated in the Missouri Photo Workshop, Cuba68. Her work has been featured online and in print for various publications such as the AP, PBS Next Avenue, SF Chronicle, SF Gate, BuzzFeed News, Vox.com, RollingStone, Dropbox, Instagram, San Francisco State Magazine, among others. Emma was awarded second place for the 2017 Multimedia Hearst Journalism Award for her story about a nine-year-old girl living with a rare bone disease, published by the San Francisco Examiner.

She loves community storytelling and is a contributor to the SF Chinatown Shorts documentary series.

View her portfolio at emmamariechiang.com and @echiangphoto

“I look for glimmers of light and beauty in the mundane and extraordinary stories that need to be told,” Emma said.