Christine R. Yano, an anthropologist at the University of Hawaii, is currently

Christine R. Yano, an anthropologist at the University of Hawaii, is currently curating a Hello Kitty exhibit at the Japanese American National Museum in Los Angeles.

Yano was corrected by Sanrio after the company proofread her texts for the exhibit, in which she described the famous character, naturally, as a cat.

“I was corrected — very firmly,” she told the Los Angeles Times. “That’s one correction Sanrio made for my script for the show. Hello Kitty is not a cat. She’s a cartoon character. She is a little girl. She is a friend. But she is not a cat. She’s never depicted on all fours. She walks and sits like a two-legged creature. She does have a pet cat of her own, however, and it’s called Charmmy Kitty.”

Hello Kitty has special significance to Asian Americans. “When Hello Kitty arrived in the U.S. in the mid-1970s, it was a commodity mainly in Asian enclaves: Chinatowns, Japantowns, etc.,” explains Yano. “In talking to Japanese Americans who grew up in the 1970s, they say, ‘That figure means so much to us because she was ours.’ It’s something they saw as an identity marker. This is why the exhibition is being held at the Japanese American National Museum. It’s about reconnecting her to this community. It gives the whole thing a certain poignancy and power.”

Read more at LA Times