What's the non-pejorative term for "shiksa"?

maybe "slattern" is a better word. is "slattern" a more polite term?

I always wanted to learn yiddish, not due to ethnic/religious reasons, but due to comedy reasons.

She puts the id back in yid, I put the oy into goy

Nope. My dissertation is on Roth, so I've read it, oh, I don't know, twenty times. It does sort of pwn this thread.

I've always thought it might be entertaining to be a shabbos goy for a while -- you could go around turning lights and stove burners on and off all day! I don't know what else is involved and granted my ideas come from the days of gaslit tenements and no central heat, when NOT lighting a match all day was basically incompatible with survival.

Altho the observant people I know just cook ahead for Saturdays and eat it cold, or put a big tile on the stove top that retains a little heat until lunch-time. Pretty straightforward.

yes, perhaps, but emphasis on the mildness. goyish is definitely an Other-ing word, but it's a product of Other-ness - an affirmation of identity. but given that Jews aren't particularly Other any more (at least in the places where most Jews live), nor as interested in affirming their cultural/religious distinction, I think it still has some pejorative meaning, but it's usually used in an ironic fashion, as an acknowledgment that the sentiment is somewhat outmoded.

Yeah, since Jewish err religious/cultural identity(?) is matrilineal, association with non-Jewish women is particularly threatening -- if a nice Jewish girl gets involved with a goyish man, at least her prospective children will still be Jewish. Not so with the hapless mensch who happens to go for blondes.

yes, but this is the 21st century

Yeah, since Jewish err religious/cultural identity(?) is matrilineal, association with non-Jewish women is particularly threatening -- if a nice Jewish girl gets involved with a goyish man, at least her prospective children will still be Jewish. Not so with the hapless mensch who happens to go for blondes.

And some of them still think exactly like this. Like my mom!!!

yeah, I was mostly talking about 'goyish'. most of the people who I hear using 'shiksa' aren't jewish.

The truth is that Yiddish thrived when most Jews were getting thrown out of every country in Europe and/or shunted into areas that were well-isolated from the Gentile populations. So there wasn't really any need for non-perjorative גויישע ווערטער. And now that Yiddish is essentially a dead language, nobody has bothered to invent a new word (at least not one that is commonly used).