Work

What does it mean to participate in design when the structures around you constrain what participation looks like? Who gets to define what counts as evidence, what success means, whose knowledge matters? This work includes sustained reflection on assets-based design, a critical examination of participatory methods, and a growing engagement with algorithm transparency and AI governance.

With cross-cutting collaborations · Through critical reflection, co-design, policy analysis

Selected publications:

• Wong-Villacrés, M., Gautam, A., Tatar, D., & DiSalvo, B. (2021). Reflections on Assets-Based Design. CSCW ‘21.
• Gautam, A., Harrison, S., & Tatar, D. (2020). p for political: Participation Without Agency Is Not Enough. PDC ‘20.
• Gautam, A. & Tatar, D. (2022). Empowering Participation Within Structures of Dependency. PDC ‘22.
• Gautam, A., Tatar, D., Matheis, C., & Kannabiran, G. (2024). Surfacing Conflicts in Participatory Design. PDC ‘24.

Each year, hundreds of thousands of people leave U.S. prisons and walk into a world that has changed around them. Support systems that exist often prioritize surveillance over service. Digital literacy gaps compound every other barrier. Since 2022, we have partnered with organizations in San Francisco and Pittsburgh that support people navigating reentry, building tools that integrate into their existing processes rather than imposing new ones.

With Project Rebound (SFSU), West End POWER, Reimagine Reentry · In local service systems, community organizations · Through co-design, prototyping, field study

Selected publications:

• Gautam, A., Gandhi, K., & Sendejo, J. (2024). Enhancing Reentry Support Programs Through Digital Literacy Integration. DIS ‘24.
• Gandu, A. & Gautam, A. (2025). Conflict in Community-Based Design. CSCW ‘25.

This work began in Nepal with an anti-trafficking organization and a group of survivors who were building lives on their own terms. They were not a user group with needs to be met. They were people navigating structures of dependency while asserting their own agency. The methods we developed (social photo-elicitation, voice-annotated web tools, assets-based design) all came from attending to what they already knew how to do.

With anti-trafficking organization in Nepal, survivors pursuing dignified reintegration · In community workshops, organizational settings · Through participatory design, qualitative inquiry, assets-based design

Selected publications:

• Gautam, A., Harrison, S., & Tatar, D. (2020). Crafting, Communality, and Computing. CHI ‘20.
• Gautam, A., Shrestha, C., & Tatar, D. (2019). Beyond Saving: Agency-First Approach Against Domestic Violence. ICTD ‘19.
• Gautam, A., Shrestha, C., Tatar, D., & Harrison, S. (2018). Social Photo-Elicitation. CSCW ‘18. Recognition for Contribution to Diversity and Inclusion.
• Gautam, A. (2021). Designing Socio-Technical Systems to Illuminate Possibilities for a Vulnerable Population. Doctoral Dissertation. SIGCHI Outstanding Dissertation Award 2022.

My earliest research asked how students in under-resourced settings could develop computational fluency without losing the texture of what they were learning. We built integrated computational thinking and science modules for middle school classrooms in Nepal, Virginia, and Texas. That work has since expanded into examining socially responsible computing education and the political economy of computing pedagogy. Several of these projects have been closely tied to my teaching.

With schools in Nepal, Virginia, Texas; San Francisco State University; Cal Poly collaborators · In classrooms, learning environments · Through curriculum design, simulation-building, field study

Selected publications:

• Gautam, A. (2025). Preparing HCI Students to Address Structural Problems Through Systems Thinking. HCI Education ‘25.
• Gautam, A., Kulkarni, A., Hug, S., Lehr, J., & Yoon, I. (2024). Socially Responsible Computing in an Introductory Course. SIGCSE ‘24.
• Kazerouni, A. M., Lee, M., Hubbard Cheuoua, A., Gautam, A., Hooshmand, S., Inventado, P. S., … & Wood, Z. (2025). The Benefits of Socially Responsible Computing in Early Computing Courses: A Multi-Institutional Study at Primarily Undergraduate Hispanic-Serving Institutions. ACM TOCE.
• Wortman, K. A., Gautam, A., Hug, S., Inventado, P. S., Kazerouni, A. M., Lehr, J., … & Wood, Z. (2025). Reflecting on Practices to Integrate Socially Responsible Computing in Introductory Computer Science Courses. SIGCSE ‘25.
• Ko, A. J., Castro, F., Gautam, A., et al. (2024). Computing, Education, and Capitalism. SIGCSE ‘24.
• Gautam, A., Bortz, W., & Tatar, D. (2020). Abstraction Through Multiple Representations. SIGCSE ‘20.
• Gautam, A., Bortz, W. E. W., & Tatar, D. (2017). Case for Integrating Computational Thinking and Science in a Low-Resource Setting. ICTD ‘17.

Language carries the texture of a community’s life. For Nepali immigrant communities navigating digital platforms and policy shifts, questions of language preservation intersect with questions of belonging, governance, and self-representation. This thread examines how digital infrastructures shape and are shaped by communities whose languages and practices sit outside dominant technological assumptions.

With Nepali immigrant communities, University of Delaware collaborators · Through qualitative inquiry, survey research

Selected publications:

• Khatiwada, P., Ciuba, A., Nayak, A., Gautam, A., & Mauriello, M. L. (2025). Regulating Social Media: Surveying the Impact of Nepali Government’s TikTok Ban. CSCW ‘25.
• Gautam, A., Tatar, D., & Harrison, S. (2019). Adding Voices to Support Web Navigation Among a Low Digital Literacy Group. DIS ‘19.