Telma G. Laurentino

Telma G. Laurentino is an evolutionary biologist working at the intersection of biodiversity, narrative, and socio-ecological change.

Her PhD and postdoctoral research focused on how species adapt and evolve in the face of abrupt environmental change. After more than a decade studying evolution and ecology from molecular to ecosystemic levels, she now interlaces that knowledge into the study of how narratives can root futures in which the economy is the system that ensures collective wellbeing, sustainability, and the inclusion of diverse humans and more-than-humans in relational co-creation.

She holds a longstanding commitment to translating science into creative languages that can empower people beyond the academy. She teaches in universities and school settings, and often designs and organizes multisensory, active-learning workshops for diverse publics and contexts. Two projects anchor this practice: evALLution, which makes biodiversity and ecology knowledge accessible to people with blindness and diverse sensory abilities, built on a framework of belonging; and ECOllective poetry, which nurtures collective affective capacity to engage with complex socio-ecological (wicked) issues, grounded in anti-hierarchical poetic co-creation and ecological kinship.

Constantly learning in transdisciplinary contexts, and from kin living systems and organisms, she looks for the life-aligned practices and relational ethics that ask how we can learn and enact the (hi)stories that seed just and sustainable futures.