Editing Obfuscation (section)

==Eschew==
"Eschew obfuscation", also stated as "eschew obfuscation, espouse elucidation", is a humorous [[fumblerules|fumblerule]] used by English teachers and professors when lecturing about proper writing techniques. Literally, the phrase means "avoid being unclear" or "avoid being unclear, support being clear", but the use of relatively uncommon words causes confusion in much of the audience (those lacking the [[vocabulary]]), making the statement an example of [[irony]], and more precisely a [[heterological]] phrase. The phrase has appeared in print at least as early as 1959, when it was used as a section heading in a [[NASA]] document.<ref>United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration, ''NASA Technical Memorandum'' (1959), p. 171.</ref>

An earlier similar phrase appears in [[Mark Twain]]'s ''[[Fenimore Cooper's Literary Offenses]]'', where he lists rule fourteen of good writing as "eschew [[surplusage]]".