HCI Education in Brazil in the Light of Curricula Guidelines

Human-Computer Interaction (HCI) has been researched, practiced and taught around the world in diverse contexts. In this paper, we focus on Brazil and its particular context. We interviewed thirteen professors to investigate their approach in introductory HCI courses within computing undergraduate courses. This paper reports a portion of this analysis, focusing on the content being taught, and comparing it to national and international guidelines. Our results show that most professors use a project-centered approach in the course, balancing theory and practice. Semiotics and accessibility are strong influences in our context. No international guidelines mention any semiotic approach to HCI, although they are usually more detailed than national guidelines. International guidelines provide a list of topics together with a list of learning outcomes, while national guidelines are more focused on topics. We contribute to the HCI community by providing an analysis of the Brazilian context.