Poh Lin Lee
Poh Lin Lee is a teacher, writer, and consultant on narrative therapy practice. She accompanies filmmakers, therapists, researchers and community practitioners with a unique approach influenced by decolonial, feminist, and non-extractive worldviews. She brings energy to cultivating non-competitive and collective spaces that nourish practitioners and expands the possibilities for preferred movement, radical alliances and creative risk.
As a Narrative Therapist, Poh Lin worked alongside people and communities affected by violence, trauma and displacement for 20 years across different countries, cultures and languages. Despite the attempts of oppressive systems to silence and divide communities, people continue to circulate stories of solidarity, refusal, dignity and creative survival. Those are the voices she wishes to be in relationship with when exploring projects through a trauma/justice-informed lens.
Poh Lin was a collaborator on the award winning film Island of the Hungry Ghosts (2018), where she moved between the roles of narrative therapy consultant to filmmaker, film protagonist and facilitating therapy sessions with people seeking asylum within the film. These experiences have contributed to her particular focus on developing nuanced practices of consent, co-design and care in ways that honours the specific context, relationships and communities connected to the project.
Through her different contexts of practice she has been developing our multi-storied bodies practices, a form of co-research that invites us to move beyond single-storied bodies and into practices of collective consultation that hold power, care, justice, and possibility at the centre.
Poh Lin Lee is a teacher, writer, and consultant on narrative therapy practice. She accompanies filmmakers, therapists, researchers and community practitioners with a unique approach influenced by decolonial, feminist, and non-extractive worldviews. She brings energy to cultivating non-competitive and collective spaces that nourish practitioners and expands the possibilities for preferred movement, radical alliances and creative risk.
As a Narrative Therapist, Poh Lin worked alongside people and communities affected by violence, trauma and displacement for 20 years across different countries, cultures and languages. Despite the attempts of oppressive systems to silence and divide communities, people continue to circulate stories of solidarity, refusal, dignity and creative survival. Those are the voices she wishes to be in relationship with when exploring projects through a trauma/justice-informed lens.
Poh Lin was a collaborator on the award winning film Island of the Hungry Ghosts (2018), where she moved between the roles of narrative therapy consultant to filmmaker, film protagonist and facilitating therapy sessions with people seeking asylum within the film. These experiences have contributed to her particular focus on developing nuanced practices of consent, co-design and care in ways that honours the specific context, relationships and communities connected to the project.
Through her different contexts of practice she has been developing our multi-storied bodies practices, a form of co-research that invites us to move beyond single-storied bodies and into practices of collective consultation that hold power, care, justice, and possibility at the centre.
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Current positions:
Faculty Dulwich Centre Faculty & Board Re-authoring Teaching Film and Narrative Therapy Consultant Film in Mind Honorary clinical fellow School of Social Work, University of Melbourne International Advisory Committee Latin American Journal of Clinical Social Work Editorial Board International Journal of Narrative Therapy and Community Work |
Consultant and workshop facilitator for:
The Institute of Narrative Therapy, UK The Flaherty, USA International Documentary Association, USA The Pritzker Pucker Studio Lab for the Promotion of Mental Health via Cinematic Arts, USA DocX Archive Lab Duke University, USA Netflix, USA Australian Film Television and Radio School, Australia Victorian College of the Arts, Film and Television, Australia |
Publications
Phillips, T., Lee, P. L., & Trundle, C. (2025). Narrative Sandplay Interviews: Methodology, Implications and Lessons Learned From a COVID-19 Border Study. International Journal of Qualitative Methods, 24. https://doi.org/10.1177/16094069251343658
Lee, Poh Lin & Rose, Helena (2025). Our multi-storied bodies: in practitioner-centred conversations. Murmurations: Journal of Transformative Systemic Practice, 8(1), 89-101. https://doi.org/10.28963/8.1.16
Wang, Xiaolu & Lee, Poh Lin (2024). Chapter: Fragments contain worlds: encounters between Narrative Practice and Filmmaking. In Decolonizing Bodies. London: Bloomsbury Press
Eskioğlu, M.C; Lee, P.L; Snowdon, P. (2023) Unpacking together: therapeutic conversation as co-creation, Collateral Journal
Lee, Poh Lin (2023). Our bodies as multi-storied communities: ethics & practices. Journal of Systemic Therapies, 42(2) 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1521/jsyt.2023.42.2.1
Lee, Poh Lin (2018). Narrative Practice and Sandplay: Practice-based stories of collaboration with people seeking asylum held in mandatory detention. Journal of Systemic Therapies, 37(2) 1–16.https://doi.org/10.1521/jsyt.2018.37.2.1
La Revista Latinoamericana de Trabajo Social Clínico La Práctica Narrativa y la Caja de Arena: Prácticas Basadas en Historias de Colaboración con Personas que buscan asilo y que están en detención obligatoria
Lee, P. L. (2017). Narrative conversations alongside Interpreters: A locally grown outsider-witness practice. International Journal of Narrative Therapy and Community Work, (4), 18–27.
Danish translation by Dansk Forening for Systemisk og Narrativ Terapi og Konsultation
Lee, P. L. (2012). Making now precious: Working with survivors of torture and asylum seekers. International Journal of Narrative Therapy and Community Work, (1), 1–9.
Lee, Poh Lin & Rose, Helena (2025). Our multi-storied bodies: in practitioner-centred conversations. Murmurations: Journal of Transformative Systemic Practice, 8(1), 89-101. https://doi.org/10.28963/8.1.16
Wang, Xiaolu & Lee, Poh Lin (2024). Chapter: Fragments contain worlds: encounters between Narrative Practice and Filmmaking. In Decolonizing Bodies. London: Bloomsbury Press
Eskioğlu, M.C; Lee, P.L; Snowdon, P. (2023) Unpacking together: therapeutic conversation as co-creation, Collateral Journal
Lee, Poh Lin (2023). Our bodies as multi-storied communities: ethics & practices. Journal of Systemic Therapies, 42(2) 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1521/jsyt.2023.42.2.1
Lee, Poh Lin (2018). Narrative Practice and Sandplay: Practice-based stories of collaboration with people seeking asylum held in mandatory detention. Journal of Systemic Therapies, 37(2) 1–16.https://doi.org/10.1521/jsyt.2018.37.2.1
La Revista Latinoamericana de Trabajo Social Clínico La Práctica Narrativa y la Caja de Arena: Prácticas Basadas en Historias de Colaboración con Personas que buscan asilo y que están en detención obligatoria
Lee, P. L. (2017). Narrative conversations alongside Interpreters: A locally grown outsider-witness practice. International Journal of Narrative Therapy and Community Work, (4), 18–27.
Danish translation by Dansk Forening for Systemisk og Narrativ Terapi og Konsultation
Lee, P. L. (2012). Making now precious: Working with survivors of torture and asylum seekers. International Journal of Narrative Therapy and Community Work, (1), 1–9.
Hybrid Filmmaking and Narrative Therapy
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Island of the Hungry Ghosts Roles: Film participant[ant, therapist, narrative therapy consultant The best documentary award goes to a film that demonstrates extraordinary mastery of the full symphonic range of cinematic tools: cinematography, editing, score, sound design and, perhaps greatest of all, an exquisite use of metaphor. To a film that moved us deeply, impressed us immensely and made us feel we were witnessing nothing less than the emergence, fully formed, of a major new cinematic talent." Tribeca Jury, 2018 |
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The wolves always come at night Role: narrative therapy consultant - decolonising film process and practices; trauma-focused care and community inclusion. A feature hybrid film alongside a Mongolian nomadic family tracing their displacement from their homeland to the ger districts of the city. Australia's official selection for Best International Feature at the 2026 Academy Awards. |
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