Participatory Storytelling for Urban Transitions: Using Social Learning Video to Co-Produce Climate Adaptation Knowledge in Southeast Asian Urban Settings

Rapid urbanization and climate change are intensifying flood risks across Southeast Asia, where top-down adaptation often marginalizes local knowledge, equity, and cultural values. While STEM-based (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) offer promise, their uptake is constrained by institutional silos, weak participation, and limited context-specific evidence, challenges best addressed through Social Sciences and Humanities (SSH) insights into governance, culture, and justice. This project applies an interdisciplinary SSH–STEM methodology, led from an SSH perspective, to co-produce actionable, equitable adaptation knowledge in Malaysia’s flood-prone Johor River Basin. It will:1.SSH – analyze how diverse groups perceive and respond to flood risks using qualitative and spatial methods;2.SSH – develop and test Social Learning Video to co-create narratives of community adaptation;3.SSH+STEM – apply participatory SWOT-IE with technical assessments of socially grounded NBS;4.SSH+STEM – produce accessible outputs, including visual policy briefs and open-access training tools.Grounded in community fieldwork (SSH) and supported by technical NBS modelling (STEM), the project will be refined at Newcastle University’s Centre for Water, enabling two-way Global South–North knowledge exchange. It advances the EU Green Deal and SDGs 11 & 13, delivering transferable SSH–STEM tools for inclusive, climate-resilient urban adaptation.