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Language ideologies are viewpoints on language systems, language use and (pre-)conceptions of language that are shaped by socio-cultural factors, advanced by the interests of groups or individuals, and serve in the construction of (group-) identity. The term (language) ideology encompasses both a descriptive, neutral connotation and a subjective, negative connotation. In this Handbook, we address the concept of ideology in its descriptive sense, employing it as an analytical category to elucidate the language ideologies found in German, English, French, Italian and Croatian.

For the individual languages discussed in this Handbook, language institutions have, to varying degrees, promoted debate surrounding the cultivation, standardisation and critique of the language. Language academies such as the Accademia della Crusca or the Académie française are, without question, among the most well-known and, in a certain sense, most symbolic of language institutions. However, not only language academies but also linguistic societies may promote a language-critical, and partly puristic agenda and thus fulfill a standardising function.

In this third volume of the “Online Handbook of Language Criticism – A European Perspective”,
linguistic purism is being understood as both criticism of language usage on the level of
parole and criticism of forms and structures of a language on the level of langue. The articles in
this volume illustrate in comparative perspective in which constellations of languages linguistic
purism in German, English, French, Italian, and Croatian was relevant in the past, and still
is today, how the individual languages were and are affected by language-puristic activities,
and which actors and discourses have formed and framed language-puristic activities in the
different language cultures.

This second volume of the “Online Handbook of Language Criticism – A European Perspective”
focuses on the processes of standardisation in German, English, French, Italian, and Croatian
and investigates them in the context of language criticism, comparing different aspects of
standardisation and authorities involved. It highlights diachronic aspects relating to the
shaping of norms for written and spoken language as well as synchronic aspects, such as the
development of pluricentric standards and issues of orthography and codification.

The process of setting norms for language and language use is closely related to critique of language and its use. The German term Sprachnormenkritik as yet has no equivalent in English, French, Italian, or Croatian linguistics. Notwithstanding, the concept of ›critique of language norms‹, or aspects of it, have been debated in all these languages for centuries.