How to Respond to Obscure Writing

We distinguish obscure writing from difficult writing, and argue that refereed journal publications in all disciplines can—and should—be written without undefined terminology, with identifiable claims, and with arguments for those claims. Conventional practices in mathematics, for instance, yield this outcome. There is a place for obscure writing—and potential value in obscure writing. But it would be a service to the Academy if at least refereed publications in all disciplines followed the practice of mathematics. Academic writing is often obscure. Certainly most academic writing will be difficult and seemingly incomprehensible to non-academics and even to most other academics—at least those outside of our own specialties. This is in part because specialists use a specialized vocabulary, or jargon, when they talk to each other; and it is in part because academic writing is non-trivial: it is not meant to be easy or to entertain and often involves copious data, complicated relationships, new ideas and surprising claims. Papers in my own mathematical discipline, for instance, may use a familiar vocabulary and make identifiable claims but still involve dense arguments; reading them is typically slow-going. This journal of course is known for its commitment to clarity; its short-lived Philosophy and Literature Bad Writing Contest from the 1990s is still discussed. This commitment, if multiplied across the Academy, would be a valuable service to time-constrained academics. We give a definition of obscurity that allows that writing may be both important and obscure, but argue that obscure writing can—and should—be banished from refereed publications in every discipline. The conventions of refereeing in Mathematics are a useful example. Jargon is not an issue. Experts in every discipline need jargon: it is essential to the compact and efficient transmission of ideas. Jargon is a specialized vocabulary that is translatable into non-specialized vocabulary; the word “jargon” is used