''Sheigetz'' or ''shegetz'' (שייגעץ or in

Hebrew Hebrew (; ''ʿÎbrit'') is a Northwest Semitic languages, Northwest Semitic language within the Afroasiatic languages, Afroasiatic language family. A regional dialect of the Canaanite languages, it was natively spoken by the Israelites and ...

שֵׁיְגֶּץ; alternative

Romanization In linguistics, romanization is the conversion of text from a different writing system to the Latin script, Roman (Latin) script, or a system for doing so. Methods of romanization include transliteration, for representing written text, and tra ...

s incl. ''shaygetz'', ''shaigetz'', ''sheygets'') with the alternative form ''shkotz'' (plural: ''sheygetses'' and ''shkotzim'', respectively

Philologos Philologos is an etymology column about Yiddish, Hebrew and Jewish words and phrases. , it has run for about 34 years. Its anonymous author is known to be translator Hillel Halkin. Publishing history The column ran weekly for over 24 years in ...

(

Hillel Halkin Hillel Halkin (; born 1939) is an American-born Israeli translator, biographer, literary critic, and novelist who has lived in Israel since 1970. Biography Hillel Halkin was born in New York City two months before the outbreak of World War II. ...

)
''Sheygetz''

The Forward ''The Forward'' (), formerly known as ''The Jewish Daily Forward'', is an American news media organization for a Jewish American audience. Founded in 1897 as a Yiddish-language daily socialist newspaper, ''The New York Times'' reported that Set ...

, 21 April 2006. Accessed 10 June 2022.) is a

Yiddish Yiddish, historically Judeo-German, is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated in 9th-century Central Europe, and provided the nascent Ashkenazi community with a vernacular based on High German fused with ...

word that has entered English to refer to a non-

Jew Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...

ish boy or young man. It may also be used by an observant Jew when referring to a non-observant Jewish man. It is mostly used disparagingly, although it can also be used in appreciation by semantic reversal, similar to "rascal" becoming positive when used affectionately in regard to a teenager. It is sometimes used to describe a specifically undesirable or low-class non-Jew versus a decent non-Jew.

Etymology

The word ''shegetz'', like its feminine counterpart '' shiksa'', according to the ''

Oxford English Dictionary The ''Oxford English Dictionary'' (''OED'') is the principal historical dictionary of the English language, published by Oxford University Press (OUP), a University of Oxford publishing house. The dictionary, which published its first editio ...

'', is derived from ''sheqeṣ'' ("a detested thing").

Alternative forms

In former times, it was common practice for

Ashkenazi Jews Ashkenazi Jews ( ; also known as Ashkenazic Jews or Ashkenazim) form a distinct subgroup of the Jewish diaspora, that emerged in the Holy Roman Empire around the end of the first millennium CE. They traditionally speak Yiddish, a language ...

who were harassed by youths to label their tormentors ''shkotzim''. Nacham Grossbard of

Haifa Haifa ( ; , ; ) is the List of cities in Israel, third-largest city in Israel—after Jerusalem and Tel Aviv—with a population of in . The city of Haifa forms part of the Haifa metropolitan area, the third-most populous metropolitan area i ...

, writing in the ''

Memorial Book A book of remembrance is a book commemorating those who have died, usually listing their names in date or alphabetical order. They are often compiled to commemorate war dead and others who have died on military operations. Another use is to com ...

for the Community of Ciechanów'' (1962), recounted these memories of his early years in

Poland Poland, officially the Republic of Poland, is a country in Central Europe. It extends from the Baltic Sea in the north to the Sudetes and Carpathian Mountains in the south, bordered by Lithuania and Russia to the northeast, Belarus and Ukrai ...

: "At the finish of the match, as soon as the whistle blows, we Jewish boys run as fast as we can, out of breath, all the way home in order not to have stones thrown at us or be hit by the shkotzim (non-Jewish boys)." According to blogger

(

), the form ''shkotz'' was less used in Europe; he wrote that it is a

back-formation Back-formation is the process or result of creating a neologism, new word via Morphology (linguistics), morphology, typically by removing or substituting actual or supposed affixes from a lexical item, in a way that expands the number of lexemes ...

that only occurred in America."shkotz"
at the Jewish English Lexicon, quoting the article ''Sheygetz'' by Philologos.

References

{{Religious slurs Pejorative terms for people Jewish culture Yiddish words and phrases Pejorative terms for men Pejorative terms for strangers and foreigners

Etymology

Alternative forms

See also

References