Is this one of the reason why elitist professors get a bad name?

That's a prime example of psychobabble, aka Liberalese. While sane men strive for clarity, hard left academics cultivate the impenetrable style: a Chinese Wall of words, words, words. Lurking behind the wall there may be some tiny mouse of a thought process; but maybe not. Either way, psychobabble is an idiom that kills communication--rather like Orwell's Newspeak. At the same time it pes for "profundity" among the verbally unskilled. Thus when the psychobabble goes into high gear, freshman jaws hang open; at best, then, it seems a form of crowd control... --Carlos