"nostalgia for a lost blackness she never really owned." Language Throughout the novel, many of the characters engage in code-switching as a means to cultural acceptance. Birdie in particular masters changing her speech patterns as her situation and identity change. When she and Cole begin attending Nkrumah, they learn African American Vernacular English from Ebony magazine to appease their predominantly black classmates. And when Birdie begins school in New Hampshire, she learns to become comfortable with the use of racial slurs in conversation with her peers. She also acquires some Jewish phrases to appear more Jewish while in public. Other characters also use code-switching. For instance, when Birdie's father, Deck, is talking to his friend Ronnie Parkman he speaks in African American Vernacular English. Likewise, Birdie recounts Redbone as speaking in a "strained dialect", recognizing his failed attempt at black slang during Aunt Dot's going-away party. Critical reception In general, for her debut novel, Caucasia, Danzy Senna received positive reviews that praised her writing, themes and innovation. Critics noted the Bildungsroman, Post-soul angle Senna takes to reinvent the tragic mulatto genre, in which instead of a "doomed interracial love affair at its center ... here the lovers are sisters." The New York Times Book Review applauded how, "Senna gives new meaning to the twin universal desires for a lost childhood and a new adult self," in an environment in which she passes as white and can "look and act like anyone." The New York Times also commended Senna's execution in joining themes of pubescence with ethnicity saying, "What Ms. Senna gets so painfully well is how the standard-issue cruelties of adolescence (like being the new kid trying to win acceptance) are revitalized when they encounter race." Reviews attribute Senna's ability to write this coming of age novel about a mixed-race girl so well because she herself lived a life that parallels that of the protagonist's, Birdie. Kirkus Review noted Senna is a "young Boston-raised writer ... herself the product of a mixed marriage, which gives her first fiction an authenticity..." Lori Tharps muses, "The voice of Birdie Lee is so real and compelling, you can't help but wonder if the story is semi-autobiographical..." Claudia Arias goes on to say that Birdie's life is not just a reflection of Senna's life, but a "testimony of the lived experiences of being multiracial and a critique of the rigidity of racial categories in