Clarisse Sieckenius de Souza is a full professor at the Informatics Department of Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio), where she does research in the area of human–computer interaction (HCI) and has developed the theory of Semiotic Engineering.

[1] She is the founder of SERG (Semiotic Engineering Research Group) at Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro (PUC-Rio).

Souza got her bachelor's degree in languages (with a focus on translation-interpretation) in 1979, a master's degree in Portuguese language in 1982 and a doctorate degree in applied linguistics in 1988, all by the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro and only after she joined the department of informatics of PUC-Rio, where she became a professor in 2006.

Clarisse is also one of CRA-W / Anita Borg Institute's Notable Women in Computing featured in Jessica Dickinson Goodman's cad deck and poster.

She has three international books on the topic of semiotic engineering: