Tan Su Lin is an award-winning journalist, communications specialist, science communicator, and media trainer with more than sixteen years of experience in journalism and communications. In 2020, she cofounded the Science Media Centre Malaysia (SMC) to champion the importance of effective science communication and evidence-based reporting. SMC is Malaysia’s first information resource centre of its kind, supporting local journalists covering complex science topics that make the headlines. She is currently pursuing her PhD in Climate Change Communications at Monash University Malaysia.
Her Climate Imagination Mini-Fellowship project will take place in Sabah, a Malaysian state on the island of Borneo. She will pursue a co-produced, collaborative research project with the Kadazandusun people, the largest Indigenous group in Sabah. The research will explore connections between Traditional Ecological Knowledge (TEK) and Western science approaches in building climate adaptation and resilience strategies. The project will involve ethnographic research in Kadazandusun communities, interviews with community members, and focus-group discussions designed to foster two-way knowledge exchanges between TEK and Western science.