diff --git a/Lib/fontTools/misc/textTools.py b/Lib/fontTools/misc/textTools.py
index ac3d2eddb..08c59909d 100644
--- a/Lib/fontTools/misc/textTools.py
+++ b/Lib/fontTools/misc/textTools.py
@@ -7,15 +7,15 @@ import ast
 import string
 
 
-def safeEval(data):
-	"""A (kindof) safe replacement for eval."""
-	return ast.literal_eval(data)
+# alias kept for backward compatibility
+safeEval = ast.literal_eval
 
 
 def readHex(content):
 	"""Convert a list of hex strings to binary data."""
 	return deHexStr(strjoin(chunk for chunk in content if isinstance(chunk, basestring)))
 
+
 def deHexStr(hexdata):
 	"""Convert a hex string to binary data."""
 	hexdata = strjoin(hexdata.split())