Why does HCI belong in a CS department?
There was a debate during Friday’s tea time about why HCI belongs in a CS department. The discussion was motivated by experiences explaining our research area to other CS graduate students and faculty.
One approach is to question the challenge in the first place — why is computer architecture or theory part of Computer Science? They could just as easily be construed as belonging to EE or Math departments.
Another view is that the defining element of Computer Science is computation. HCI researchers in computer science care about what can (and should) be done with computation, with a focus on the user and the interaction. Related, one could argue that everyone who does computer science is also producing interfaces, and that we need to understand and advance interface science as steadily as we do other areas.
Thoughts? Let us know.