How can I communicate that the word limit prevents you from elaborating something in an essay?

How to communicate that word limit prevents you from elaborate something in essay?

You don’t. You take the time and put in the effort to make your argument in the available space. If you do that, more likely than not the resulting essay will be a better piece of writing that does a better job of putting your argument across than if it had been longer. Thus, you will have nothing to excuse or apologize for.

And don’t take it from me, many famous thinkers have expressed similar thoughts about the benefits of conciseness (and the difficulty of achieving those benefits). My favorite one of these quotes is Woodrow Wilson’s reply when he was asked how long he takes to write a speech:

“That depends on the length of the speech,” answered the President. “If it is a ten-minute speech it takes me all of two weeks to prepare it; if it is a half-hour speech it takes me a week; if I can talk as long as I want to it requires no preparation at all. I am ready now.”

Stock phrases you will hear are "is beyond the scope of this piece" or "is excluded in the interests of conciseness", perhaps with a pointer to where it has been discussed.

You might for example see something like "The fooing of bars became popular in 2025. The full process involved in fooing is beyond the scope of this piece, but the topic is reviewed in Jones et al., 2030".

Or even "The fooing of bars became popular in 2025. Fooing is a complex process (reviewed Jones et al, 2030)".

But probably if you are thinking that you can't fit something in then either:

• a. It's not that important and you can leave it out.
• b. It is important and you've included something that isn't.

The professor will understand how much can fit within a word limit, and therefore what level of importance is needed for inclusion. If you don't include a connected but unimportant topic, the professor will know why this is. Part of what you are being assessed on is judging which topics are important enough to cover in depth.

How do academics write that word limit occludes elaboration?

We don't normally try to argue our way around them. First, because it would be unprofessional. Second, because word limits, though inconvenient for the writer, tend to improve the quality for the reader.

We simply get used to word limits and learn to communicate efficiently.