The Institute of the Polish Language (IPL) at the Polish Academy of Sciences (PAS) is the only scientific research facility in Poland dealing with examining the Polish language in all its aspects and variations.

Organizationally, the Institute was founded as the PAS facility in 1973. It was joined by the community of researchers and scholars of Polish dealing with dialectology, onomastics, language history, a descriptive grammar of the Polish language, new Polish vocabulary, phenomena associated with the development of contemporary Polish. They were mainly scientists from Krakow and Warsaw from branches operating under The Polish Academy of Sciences since 1952, and which were followers of the activity performed at the laboratory of the former (established in 1872) Academy of Learning (after the end of World War I – the Polish Academy of Learning in Krakow).

The seat of The Institute of the Polish Language is a building at 31 Mickiewicz avenue in Krakow. Here is the directorate and administration, and most of the departments and laboratories. These are: the Department of Polish Dialectology, Department of the History of the Polish Language (with 2 laboratories: Old Polish and Historical Semantics), Department of Onomastics (with 2 laboratories: the Anthroponymical one and the Toponymical one), Department of Contemporary Polish and the Language Theory (with 3 laboratories: the Methodological one, the Sociolinguistic one and the Great Dictionary of the Polish Language one), in addition: the Linguistic Geography Laboratory and the Medieval Latin Laboratory. Moreover, there are branches in Warsaw: the Department of Linguistics (with 3 laboratories: The History of the Polish Language of the 17th and 18th Century, The Dictionary of Ostróda County, Warmia and Masuria Dialects and Borderlands Polish) and the Language Observatory.

Since its inception, the Institute was appointed to conduct great linguistic studies of the Polish language of a fundamental nature, to carry out monumental works that are particularly important for the Polish culture, which could not be done in a different way than with the involvement of large teams of researchers engaged in work lasting many years. Multivolume Polish language dictionaries, linguistic atlases and numerous monographs resulted from years of work of individual teams at IPL PAS . Such detailed and laborious studies could not, and even today cannot, be conducted at university facilities because of the specificity of their work.

In the past the post of the director of the Institute was filled by: Prof. Stanisław Urbańczyk (years 1973-1979), Prof. Władysław Lubaś (between 1979-1991) followed by Prof. Kazimierz Rymut (1992 - 2002) and Prof. Ireneusz Bobrowski (2002 - 2008). Since September 2008, this post has been held by Prof. Piotr Żmigrodzki.

The roots of research conducted at IPL PAS reach back to the late nineteenth century, when the Academy of Learning has decided to work on the old Polish dictionary. Work on this piece, begun in 1873, continued for many years. Currently, the Institute conducts research in the field of a scientific specialization being the Polish linguistics, including theory and methodology of linguistics, grammatical construction of the Polish language, corpus linguistics, sociolinguistics, language history, dialectology, onomastics, relations of the Polish language with other Slavic languages and Latin. In addition, one of the important tasks of the Institute is publishing language sources, including recent electronic versions of them. The reference is to the Polish Medieval Writing Monuments Library published in 2006. This study is the only, unique on the European scale, research and editorial project completed under the supervision of Prof. W. Twardzik. The DVD contains a new edition (transliteration and transcription, along with a critical apparatus, digital images of manuscripts) of the most important monuments of medieval writing (until 1500) in Polish. The Institute can also pride itself on the Internet edition of the Dictionary of the Polish language of the seventeenth and the first half of the eighteenth century and the so-called Dictionary of Vilnius. The Great Dictionary of the Polish Language, work on which is currently in progress under the leadership of Prof. P. Żmigrodzki, will also be made available on-line.

It is worth noting that IPL employees accomplished and continue to carry out several joint international research projects, such as the Slavic linguistic atlas (OLA) and the Atlas of the languages of Europe (Atlas Linguarum Europae – ALE). Our employees have worked together on a joint Polish-German grant, focusing on existing borrowings in the Polish language from the German language (a dictionary of these borrowings was to be published by the German side), also released - in cooperation with the Germans -a dictionary of names of Poles in the Ruhr (Vol. I, Volume II will be published in 2010) and in the international research project of Deutsche Ortsnamen - developing the etymology of place names from those areas in Poland where German was spoken (to be published in 2010 by de Gruyter).

Many current and former employees of the Institute belong to prestigious scientific associations, domestic and foreign. The members of the PAL (Polish Academy of Learning) are: Prof. K. Pisarek, Prof. M.. Kucała, Prof. R. Laskowski, (active members), members of the Societas Linguistica Europaea are: Prof. K. Pisarek, Prof. Z. Topolińska, Prof. R. Laskowski, Prof. W. Lubaś; further, members of the International Comittee of Onomastics Sciences are: Prof. A. Cieślik, Prof. B. Czopek-Kopciuch (currently a board member). Prof. Laskowski is also a member of the Royal Scientific Society in Gothenburg. Several of our professors are chairmen of various commissions and international committees: Prof. A. Cieślik is a chairwoman of the Onomastic Commission at the Linguistic Committee of the PAS and also the chair of the Slavic Onomastics Commission at the International Slavists Committee, and national ones: Prof. A. Cieślik and Prof. B. Czopek-Kopciuch are members of the Commission of Local Names and Physiographical Objects at the Ministry of Interior and Administration (Prof. B. Czopek-Kopciuch serves as the Chair of the Commission), Prof. Renata Przybylska serves as the President of the Polish Linguistic Society, Prof. Cieślik is a member of the Linguistic Committee of the PAS and a member of the Polish Language Council. Many professors take part in editorial boards of scientific journals, or edit them, for example, Prof. M., Prof. M. Kucała, Prof. M. Malec, Prof. K. Kowalik, Prof. P. Żmigrodzki, Prof. A Tyrpa – The Polish Language, Prof. A. Cieślik, Prof. M. Malec, Prof. B. Czopek-Kopciuch and Prof. K. Skowronek - Onomastica, Prof. I. Bobrowski, Prof. M. Grochowski, Prof. R. Laskowski, Prof. W. Lubaś - Polonica, Prof. W. Lubaś - Sociolinguistics, Prof. R. Laskowski, Prof. I. Bobrowski, Prof. R. L. Górski - Studies in Polish Linguistics, Prof. R. Laskowski - Russkij Jazyk, Prof. B. Czopek-Kopciuch - Onomastica Slavogermanica.

The Institute of the Polish Language also runs doctoral studies and the publishing activity of numerous scientific publications.

Our publication series are: Prace Instytutu Języka Polskiego PAN (The work of the Institute of the Polish Language at the Polish Academy of Sciences), Studia dialektologiczne (Dialectological Studies), Studia gramatyczne (Grammatical Studies), Studia historyczno-językowe (Historical and Linguistic Studies), Nowe studia leksykograficzne (New Lexicographical Studies), Współczesny język polski (Contemporary Polish Language) and Polskie słownictwo kresowe (Polish Borderlands Vocabulary).

The following periodicals are constantly issued: Polonica, Socjolingwistyka (Sociolinguistics) and Studies in Polish Linguistics.

The editorial board of Onomastica, the periodical that is financed jointly with the Division I of PAS, is also located at the Institute.