Obfuscations

Part of speech: noun

Definitions

1. The act of making something unclear or unintelligible through complex explanations or ambiguous language
2. the process of obscuring meaning or truth to confuse or mislead
3. the deliberate act of hiding or complicating information to prevent understanding

Etymology: The plural "obfuscations" is simply the plural of "obfuscation," so the real story lies in the noun. It came into English from Middle English "obfuscacioun," which was borrowed from Latin "obfuscātiō," a noun built from the verb "obfuscāre," meaning "to darken." That verb is a compound of "ob," meaning "over" or "against," and "fuscāre," meaning "to make dark," which itself comes from "fuscus," "dark" or "dusky." The original sense was literal: to cover something in shadow or to dim it. The Latin root gave English a family of dark-related words, but "obfuscation" traveled furthest from the physical sense, moving from dimming light to dimming meaning. Once a thing was darkened, it became hard to see clearly, and by extension, language that hides its meaning took on the same image.

Synonyms: confusions, muddles, ambiguities, cloudings, murkiness

Antonyms: clarifications, explanations, illuminations, simplifications, clarity