diff --git a/docs/intro/tutorial.rst b/docs/intro/tutorial.rst
index 1768badbb..5f35dc936 100644
--- a/docs/intro/tutorial.rst
+++ b/docs/intro/tutorial.rst
@@ -25,16 +25,16 @@ Scrapy.
 If you're already familiar with other languages, and want to learn Python quickly, the `Python Tutorial`_ is a good resource.
 
 If you're new to programming and want to start with Python, the following books
-may be useful to you: 
+may be useful to you:
 
 * `Automate the Boring Stuff With Python`_
 
-* `How To Think Like a Computer Scientist`_ 
+* `How To Think Like a Computer Scientist`_
 
-* `Learn Python 3 The Hard Way`_ 
+* `Learn Python 3 The Hard Way`_
 
 You can also take a look at `this list of Python resources for non-programmers`_,
-as well as the `suggested resources in the learnpython-subreddit`_. 
+as well as the `suggested resources in the learnpython-subreddit`_.
 
 .. _Python: https://www.python.org/
 .. _this list of Python resources for non-programmers: https://wiki.python.org/moin/BeginnersGuide/NonProgrammers
@@ -62,7 +62,7 @@ This will create a ``tutorial`` directory with the following contents::
             __init__.py
 
             items.py          # project items definition file
-            
+
             middlewares.py    # project middlewares file
 
             pipelines.py      # project pipelines file
@@ -287,8 +287,8 @@ to be scraped, you can at least get **some** data.
 
 Besides the :meth:`~scrapy.selector.SelectorList.getall` and
 :meth:`~scrapy.selector.SelectorList.get` methods, you can also use
-the :meth:`~scrapy.selector.SelectorList.re` method to extract using `regular
-expressions`_:
+the :meth:`~scrapy.selector.SelectorList.re` method to extract using
+:doc:`regular expressions <library/re>`:
 
 >>> response.css('title::text').re(r'Quotes.*')
 ['Quotes to Scrape']
@@ -305,7 +305,6 @@ with a selector (see :ref:`topics-developer-tools`).
 `Selector Gadget`_ is also a nice tool to quickly find CSS selector for
 visually selected elements, which works in many browsers.
 
-.. _regular expressions: https://docs.python.org/3/library/re.html
 .. _Selector Gadget: https://selectorgadget.com/
 
 
diff --git a/docs/topics/contracts.rst b/docs/topics/contracts.rst
index 43db8f101..319f577bc 100644
--- a/docs/topics/contracts.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/contracts.rst
@@ -136,7 +136,7 @@ Detecting check runs
 ====================
 
 When ``scrapy check`` is running, the ``SCRAPY_CHECK`` environment variable is
-set to the ``true`` string. You can use `os.environ`_ to perform any change to
+set to the ``true`` string. You can use :data:`os.environ` to perform any change to
 your spiders or your settings when ``scrapy check`` is used::
 
     import os
@@ -148,5 +148,3 @@ your spiders or your settings when ``scrapy check`` is used::
         def __init__(self):
             if os.environ.get('SCRAPY_CHECK'):
                 pass  # Do some scraper adjustments when a check is running
-
-.. _os.environ: https://docs.python.org/3/library/os.html#os.environ
diff --git a/docs/topics/coroutines.rst b/docs/topics/coroutines.rst
index 487cf4c6c..5f61d6796 100644
--- a/docs/topics/coroutines.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/coroutines.rst
@@ -76,8 +76,8 @@ becomes::
 
 Coroutines may be used to call asynchronous code. This includes other
 coroutines, functions that return Deferreds and functions that return
-`awaitable objects`_ such as :class:`~asyncio.Future`. This means you can use
-many useful Python libraries providing such code::
+:term:`awaitable objects <awaitable>` such as :class:`~asyncio.Future`.
+This means you can use many useful Python libraries providing such code::
 
     class MySpider(Spider):
         # ...
@@ -107,4 +107,3 @@ Common use cases for asynchronous code include:
   :ref:`the screenshot pipeline example<ScreenshotPipeline>`).
 
 .. _aio-libs: https://github.com/aio-libs
-.. _awaitable objects: https://docs.python.org/3/glossary.html#term-awaitable
diff --git a/docs/topics/downloader-middleware.rst b/docs/topics/downloader-middleware.rst
index 8d3ea51f3..1a87d07b6 100644
--- a/docs/topics/downloader-middleware.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/downloader-middleware.rst
@@ -739,7 +739,7 @@ HttpProxyMiddleware
    This middleware sets the HTTP proxy to use for requests, by setting the
    ``proxy`` meta value for :class:`~scrapy.http.Request` objects.
 
-   Like the Python standard library modules `urllib`_ and `urllib2`_, it obeys
+   Like the Python standard library module :mod:`urllib.request`, it obeys
    the following environment variables:
 
    * ``http_proxy``
@@ -751,9 +751,6 @@ HttpProxyMiddleware
    Keep in mind this value will take precedence over ``http_proxy``/``https_proxy``
    environment variables, and it will also ignore ``no_proxy`` environment variable.
 
-.. _urllib: https://docs.python.org/2/library/urllib.html
-.. _urllib2: https://docs.python.org/2/library/urllib2.html
-
 RedirectMiddleware
 ------------------
 
@@ -1037,8 +1034,7 @@ Scrapy uses this parser by default.
 RobotFileParser
 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
 
-Based on `RobotFileParser
-<https://docs.python.org/3.7/library/urllib.robotparser.html>`_:
+Based on :class:`~urllib.robotparser.RobotFileParser`:
 
 * is Python's built-in robots.txt_ parser
 
diff --git a/docs/topics/dynamic-content.rst b/docs/topics/dynamic-content.rst
index aa326868b..3b85bfe8a 100644
--- a/docs/topics/dynamic-content.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/dynamic-content.rst
@@ -118,7 +118,7 @@ data from it depends on the type of response:
 -   If the response is HTML or XML, use :ref:`selectors
     <topics-selectors>` as usual.
 
--   If the response is JSON, use `json.loads`_ to load the desired data from
+-   If the response is JSON, use :func:`json.loads` to load the desired data from
     :attr:`response.text <scrapy.http.TextResponse.text>`::
 
         data = json.loads(response.text)
@@ -133,8 +133,9 @@ data from it depends on the type of response:
 -   If the response is JavaScript, or HTML with a ``<script/>`` element
     containing the desired data, see :ref:`topics-parsing-javascript`.
 
--   If the response is CSS, use a `regular expression`_ to extract the desired
-    data from :attr:`response.text <scrapy.http.TextResponse.text>`.
+-   If the response is CSS, use a :doc:`regular expression <library/re>` to
+    extract the desired data from
+    :attr:`response.text <scrapy.http.TextResponse.text>`.
 
 .. _topics-parsing-images:
 
@@ -171,8 +172,9 @@ JavaScript code:
 Once you have a string with the JavaScript code, you can extract the desired
 data from it:
 
--   You might be able to use a `regular expression`_ to extract the desired
-    data in JSON format, which you can then parse with `json.loads`_.
+-   You might be able to use a :doc:`regular expression <library/re>` to
+    extract the desired data in JSON format, which you can then parse with
+    :func:`json.loads`.
 
     For example, if the JavaScript code contains a separate line like
     ``var data = {"field": "value"};`` you can extract that data as follows:
@@ -244,9 +246,7 @@ along with `scrapy-selenium`_ for seamless integration.
 .. _headless browser: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Headless_browser
 .. _JavaScript: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JavaScript
 .. _js2xml: https://github.com/scrapinghub/js2xml
-.. _json.loads: https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html#json.loads
 .. _pytesseract: https://github.com/madmaze/pytesseract
-.. _regular expression: https://docs.python.org/3/library/re.html
 .. _scrapy-selenium: https://github.com/clemfromspace/scrapy-selenium
 .. _scrapy-splash: https://github.com/scrapy-plugins/scrapy-splash
 .. _Selenium: https://www.selenium.dev/
diff --git a/docs/topics/email.rst b/docs/topics/email.rst
index 72bf52227..e347c3a35 100644
--- a/docs/topics/email.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/email.rst
@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ Sending e-mail
 .. module:: scrapy.mail
    :synopsis: Email sending facility
 
-Although Python makes sending e-mails relatively easy via the `smtplib`_
+Although Python makes sending e-mails relatively easy via the :mod:`smtplib`
 library, Scrapy provides its own facility for sending e-mails which is very
 easy to use and it's implemented using :doc:`Twisted non-blocking IO
 <twisted:core/howto/defer-intro>`, to avoid interfering with the non-blocking
@@ -15,8 +15,6 @@ IO of the crawler. It also provides a simple API for sending attachments and
 it's very easy to configure, with a few :ref:`settings
 <topics-email-settings>`.
 
-.. _smtplib: https://docs.python.org/2/library/smtplib.html
-
 Quick example
 =============
 
diff --git a/docs/topics/exporters.rst b/docs/topics/exporters.rst
index e52682690..de8b51195 100644
--- a/docs/topics/exporters.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/exporters.rst
@@ -311,7 +311,7 @@ CsvItemExporter
 
    The additional keyword arguments of this ``__init__`` method are passed to the
    :class:`BaseItemExporter` ``__init__`` method, and the leftover arguments to the
-   `csv.writer`_ ``__init__`` method, so you can use any ``csv.writer`` ``__init__`` method
+   :func:`csv.writer` function, so you can use any :func:`csv.writer` function
    argument to customize this exporter.
 
    A typical output of this exporter would be::
@@ -320,8 +320,6 @@ CsvItemExporter
       Color TV,1200
       DVD player,200
 
-.. _csv.writer: https://docs.python.org/2/library/csv.html#csv.writer
-
 PickleItemExporter
 ------------------
 
@@ -335,15 +333,13 @@ PickleItemExporter
    :param protocol: The pickle protocol to use.
    :type protocol: int
 
-   For more information, refer to the `pickle module documentation`_.
+   For more information, see :mod:`pickle`.
 
    The additional keyword arguments of this ``__init__`` method are passed to the
    :class:`BaseItemExporter` ``__init__`` method.
 
    Pickle isn't a human readable format, so no output examples are provided.
 
-.. _pickle module documentation: https://docs.python.org/2/library/pickle.html
-
 PprintItemExporter
 ------------------
 
@@ -372,8 +368,8 @@ JsonItemExporter
    Exports Items in JSON format to the specified file-like object, writing all
    objects as a list of objects. The additional ``__init__`` method arguments are
    passed to the :class:`BaseItemExporter` ``__init__`` method, and the leftover
-   arguments to the `JSONEncoder`_ ``__init__`` method, so you can use any
-   `JSONEncoder`_ ``__init__`` method argument to customize this exporter.
+   arguments to the :class:`~json.JSONEncoder` ``__init__`` method, so you can use any
+   :class:`~json.JSONEncoder` ``__init__`` method argument to customize this exporter.
 
    :param file: the file-like object to use for exporting the data. Its ``write`` method should
                 accept ``bytes`` (a disk file opened in binary mode, a ``io.BytesIO`` object, etc)
@@ -393,8 +389,6 @@ JsonItemExporter
       stream-friendly format, consider using :class:`JsonLinesItemExporter`
       instead, or splitting the output in multiple chunks.
 
-.. _JSONEncoder: https://docs.python.org/2/library/json.html#json.JSONEncoder
-
 JsonLinesItemExporter
 ---------------------
 
@@ -403,8 +397,8 @@ JsonLinesItemExporter
    Exports Items in JSON format to the specified file-like object, writing one
    JSON-encoded item per line. The additional ``__init__`` method arguments are passed
    to the :class:`BaseItemExporter` ``__init__`` method, and the leftover arguments to
-   the `JSONEncoder`_ ``__init__`` method, so you can use any `JSONEncoder`_
-   ``__init__`` method argument to customize this exporter.
+   the :class:`~json.JSONEncoder` ``__init__`` method, so you can use any
+   :class:`~json.JSONEncoder` ``__init__`` method argument to customize this exporter.
 
    :param file: the file-like object to use for exporting the data. Its ``write`` method should
                 accept ``bytes`` (a disk file opened in binary mode, a ``io.BytesIO`` object, etc)
@@ -417,8 +411,6 @@ JsonLinesItemExporter
    Unlike the one produced by :class:`JsonItemExporter`, the format produced by
    this exporter is well suited for serializing large amounts of data.
 
-.. _JSONEncoder: https://docs.python.org/2/library/json.html#json.JSONEncoder
-
 MarshalItemExporter
 -------------------
 
diff --git a/docs/topics/extensions.rst b/docs/topics/extensions.rst
index 94fd2e36e..0fc83e645 100644
--- a/docs/topics/extensions.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/extensions.rst
@@ -364,7 +364,7 @@ Debugger extension
 
 .. class:: Debugger
 
-Invokes a `Python debugger`_ inside a running Scrapy process when a `SIGUSR2`_
+Invokes a :doc:`Python debugger <library/pdb>` inside a running Scrapy process when a `SIGUSR2`_
 signal is received. After the debugger is exited, the Scrapy process continues
 running normally.
 
@@ -372,5 +372,4 @@ For more info see `Debugging in Python`_.
 
 This extension only works on POSIX-compliant platforms (i.e. not Windows).
 
-.. _Python debugger: https://docs.python.org/2/library/pdb.html
 .. _Debugging in Python: https://pythonconquerstheuniverse.wordpress.com/2009/09/10/debugging-in-python/
diff --git a/docs/topics/items.rst b/docs/topics/items.rst
index 44643cb67..78612f524 100644
--- a/docs/topics/items.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/items.rst
@@ -15,8 +15,8 @@ especially in a larger project with many spiders.
 
 To define common output data format Scrapy provides the :class:`Item` class.
 :class:`Item` objects are simple containers used to collect the scraped data.
-They provide a `dictionary-like`_ API with a convenient syntax for declaring
-their available fields.
+They provide an API similar to :class:`dict` API with a convenient syntax
+for declaring their available fields.
 
 Various Scrapy components use extra information provided by Items:
 exporters look at declared fields to figure out columns to export,
@@ -24,8 +24,6 @@ serialization can be customized using Item fields metadata, :mod:`trackref`
 tracks Item instances to help find memory leaks
 (see :ref:`topics-leaks-trackrefs`), etc.
 
-.. _dictionary-like: https://docs.python.org/2/library/stdtypes.html#dict
-
 .. _topics-items-declaring:
 
 Declaring Items
@@ -79,7 +77,7 @@ Working with Items
 
 Here are some examples of common tasks performed with items, using the
 ``Product`` item :ref:`declared above  <topics-items-declaring>`. You will
-notice the API is very similar to the `dict API`_.
+notice the API is very similar to the :class:`dict` API.
 
 Creating items
 --------------
@@ -145,7 +143,7 @@ KeyError: 'Product does not support field: lala'
 Accessing all populated values
 ------------------------------
 
-To access all populated values, just use the typical `dict API`_:
+To access all populated values, just use the typical :class:`dict` API:
 
 >>> product.keys()
 ['price', 'name']
@@ -162,11 +160,9 @@ Copying items
 To copy an item, you must first decide whether you want a shallow copy or a
 deep copy.
 
-If your item contains mutable_ values like lists or dictionaries, a shallow
-copy will keep references to the same mutable values across all different
-copies.
-
-.. _mutable: https://docs.python.org/3/glossary.html#term-mutable
+If your item contains :term:`mutable` values like lists or dictionaries,
+a shallow copy will keep references to the same mutable values across all
+different copies.
 
 For example, if you have an item with a list of tags, and you create a shallow
 copy of that item, both the original item and the copy have the same list of
@@ -175,9 +171,7 @@ other item as well.
 
 If that is not the desired behavior, use a deep copy instead.
 
-See the `documentation of the copy module`_ for more information.
-
-.. _documentation of the copy module: https://docs.python.org/3/library/copy.html
+See :mod:`copy` for more information.
 
 To create a shallow copy of an item, you can either call
 :meth:`~scrapy.item.Item.copy` on an existing item
@@ -235,8 +229,8 @@ Item objects
 
     Return a new Item optionally initialized from the given argument.
 
-    Items replicate the standard `dict API`_, including its ``__init__`` method, and
-    also provide the following additional API members:
+    Items replicate the standard :class:`dict` API, including its ``__init__``
+    method, and also provide the following additional API members:
 
     .. automethod:: copy
 
@@ -249,22 +243,17 @@ Item objects
         :class:`Field` objects used in the :ref:`Item declaration
         <topics-items-declaring>`.
 
-.. _dict API: https://docs.python.org/2/library/stdtypes.html#dict
-
 Field objects
 =============
 
 .. class:: Field([arg])
 
-    The :class:`Field` class is just an alias to the built-in `dict`_ class and
+    The :class:`Field` class is just an alias to the built-in :class:`dict` class and
     doesn't provide any extra functionality or attributes. In other words,
     :class:`Field` objects are plain-old Python dicts. A separate class is used
     to support the :ref:`item declaration syntax <topics-items-declaring>`
     based on class attributes.
 
-.. _dict: https://docs.python.org/2/library/stdtypes.html#dict
-
-
 Other classes related to Item
 =============================
 
diff --git a/docs/topics/logging.rst b/docs/topics/logging.rst
index d4d22d889..675e65ef1 100644
--- a/docs/topics/logging.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/logging.rst
@@ -9,8 +9,7 @@ Logging
     explicit calls to the Python standard logging. Keep reading to learn more
     about the new logging system.
 
-Scrapy uses `Python's builtin logging system
-<https://docs.python.org/3/library/logging.html>`_ for event logging. We'll
+Scrapy uses :mod:`logging` for event logging. We'll
 provide some simple examples to get you started, but for more advanced
 use-cases it's strongly suggested to read thoroughly its documentation.
 
@@ -83,10 +82,10 @@ path::
 
 .. seealso::
 
-    Module logging, `HowTo <https://docs.python.org/2/howto/logging.html>`_
+    Module logging, :doc:`HowTo <howto/logging>`
         Basic Logging Tutorial
 
-    Module logging, `Loggers <https://docs.python.org/2/library/logging.html#logger-objects>`_
+    Module logging, :ref:`Loggers <logger>`
         Further documentation on loggers
 
 .. _topics-logging-from-spiders:
@@ -165,14 +164,12 @@ possible levels listed in :ref:`topics-logging-levels`.
 
 :setting:`LOG_FORMAT` and :setting:`LOG_DATEFORMAT` specify formatting strings
 used as layouts for all messages. Those strings can contain any placeholders
-listed in `logging's logrecord attributes docs
-<https://docs.python.org/2/library/logging.html#logrecord-attributes>`_ and
-`datetime's strftime and strptime directives
-<https://docs.python.org/2/library/datetime.html#strftime-and-strptime-behavior>`_
+listed in :ref:`logging's logrecord attributes docs <logrecord-attributes>` and
+:ref:`datetime's strftime and strptime directives <strftime-strptime-behavior>`
 respectively.
 
 If :setting:`LOG_SHORT_NAMES` is set, then the logs will not display the Scrapy
-component that prints the log. It is unset by default, hence logs contain the 
+component that prints the log. It is unset by default, hence logs contain the
 Scrapy component responsible for that log output.
 
 Command-line options
@@ -190,7 +187,7 @@ to override some of the Scrapy settings regarding logging.
 
 .. seealso::
 
-    Module `logging.handlers <https://docs.python.org/2/library/logging.handlers.html>`_
+    Module :mod:`logging.handlers`
         Further documentation on available handlers
 
 .. _custom-log-formats:
@@ -201,7 +198,7 @@ Custom Log Formats
 A custom log format can be set for different actions by extending
 :class:`~scrapy.logformatter.LogFormatter` class and making
 :setting:`LOG_FORMATTER` point to your new class.
- 
+
 .. autoclass:: scrapy.logformatter.LogFormatter
    :members:
 
@@ -256,10 +253,10 @@ scrapy.utils.log module
     In that case, its usage is not required but it's recommended.
 
     Another option when running custom scripts is to manually configure the logging.
-    To do this you can use `logging.basicConfig()`_ to set a basic root handler.
+    To do this you can use :func:`logging.basicConfig` to set a basic root handler.
 
     Note that :class:`~scrapy.crawler.CrawlerProcess` automatically calls ``configure_logging``,
-    so it is recommended to only use `logging.basicConfig()`_ together with
+    so it is recommended to only use :func:`logging.basicConfig` together with
     :class:`~scrapy.crawler.CrawlerRunner`.
 
     This is an example on how to redirect ``INFO`` or higher messages to a file::
@@ -275,7 +272,3 @@ scrapy.utils.log module
 
     Refer to :ref:`run-from-script` for more details about using Scrapy this
     way.
-
-.. _logging.basicConfig(): https://docs.python.org/2/library/logging.html#logging.basicConfig
-
-
diff --git a/docs/topics/request-response.rst b/docs/topics/request-response.rst
index b2a60ff39..573efc05f 100644
--- a/docs/topics/request-response.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/request-response.rst
@@ -174,9 +174,9 @@ Request objects
         See :ref:`topics-request-meta` for a list of special meta keys
         recognized by Scrapy.
 
-        This dict is `shallow copied`_ when the request is cloned using the
-        ``copy()`` or ``replace()`` methods, and can also be accessed, in your
-        spider, from the ``response.meta`` attribute.
+        This dict is :doc:`shallow copied <library/copy>` when the request is
+        cloned using the ``copy()`` or ``replace()`` methods, and can also be
+        accessed, in your spider, from the ``response.meta`` attribute.
 
     .. attribute:: Request.cb_kwargs
 
@@ -185,11 +185,9 @@ Request objects
         for new Requests, which means by default callbacks only get a :class:`Response`
         object as argument.
 
-        This dict is `shallow copied`_ when the request is cloned using the
-        ``copy()`` or ``replace()`` methods, and can also be accessed, in your
-        spider, from the ``response.cb_kwargs`` attribute.
-
-    .. _shallow copied: https://docs.python.org/2/library/copy.html
+        This dict is :doc:`shallow copied <library/copy>` when the request is
+        cloned using the ``copy()`` or ``replace()`` methods, and can also be
+        accessed, in your spider, from the ``response.cb_kwargs`` attribute.
 
     .. method:: Request.copy()
 
@@ -566,12 +564,10 @@ dealing with JSON requests.
       set to ``'POST'`` automatically.
    :type data: JSON serializable object
 
-   :param dumps_kwargs: Parameters that will be passed to underlying `json.dumps`_ method which is used to serialize
+   :param dumps_kwargs: Parameters that will be passed to underlying :func:`json.dumps` method which is used to serialize
        data into JSON format.
    :type dumps_kwargs: dict
 
-.. _json.dumps: https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html#json.dumps
-
 JsonRequest usage example
 -------------------------
 
@@ -706,7 +702,7 @@ Response objects
 
         A :class:`twisted.internet.ssl.Certificate` object representing
         the server's SSL certificate.
-        
+
         Only populated for ``https`` responses, ``None`` otherwise.
 
     .. method:: Response.copy()
@@ -724,18 +720,16 @@ Response objects
         Constructs an absolute url by combining the Response's :attr:`url` with
         a possible relative url.
 
-        This is a wrapper over `urlparse.urljoin`_, it's merely an alias for
+        This is a wrapper over :func:`~urllib.parse.urljoin`, it's merely an alias for
         making this call::
 
-            urlparse.urljoin(response.url, url)
+            urllib.parse.urljoin(response.url, url)
 
     .. automethod:: Response.follow
 
     .. automethod:: Response.follow_all
 
 
-.. _urlparse.urljoin: https://docs.python.org/2/library/urlparse.html#urlparse.urljoin
-
 .. _topics-request-response-ref-response-subclasses:
 
 Response subclasses
diff --git a/docs/topics/selectors.rst b/docs/topics/selectors.rst
index 1f7802c98..bb46ea80f 100644
--- a/docs/topics/selectors.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/selectors.rst
@@ -14,7 +14,7 @@ achieve this, such as:
    drawback: it's slow.
 
  * `lxml`_ is an XML parsing library (which also parses HTML) with a pythonic
-   API based on `ElementTree`_. (lxml is not part of the Python standard
+   API based on :mod:`~xml.etree.ElementTree`. (lxml is not part of the Python standard
    library.)
 
 Scrapy comes with its own mechanism for extracting data. They're called
@@ -36,7 +36,6 @@ defines selectors to associate those styles with specific HTML elements.
 
 .. _BeautifulSoup: https://www.crummy.com/software/BeautifulSoup/
 .. _lxml: https://lxml.de/
-.. _ElementTree: https://docs.python.org/2/library/xml.etree.elementtree.html
 .. _XPath: https://www.w3.org/TR/xpath/all/
 .. _CSS: https://www.w3.org/TR/selectors
 .. _parsel: https://parsel.readthedocs.io/en/latest/
diff --git a/docs/topics/settings.rst b/docs/topics/settings.rst
index 90df9a02e..18f81838f 100644
--- a/docs/topics/settings.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/settings.rst
@@ -26,9 +26,7 @@ do this by using an environment variable, ``SCRAPY_SETTINGS_MODULE``.
 
 The value of ``SCRAPY_SETTINGS_MODULE`` should be in Python path syntax, e.g.
 ``myproject.settings``. Note that the settings module should be on the
-Python `import search path`_.
-
-.. _import search path: https://docs.python.org/2/tutorial/modules.html#the-module-search-path
+Python :ref:`import search path <tut-searchpath>`.
 
 .. _populating-settings:
 
@@ -899,10 +897,9 @@ LOG_FORMAT
 
 Default: ``'%(asctime)s [%(name)s] %(levelname)s: %(message)s'``
 
-String for formatting log messages. Refer to the `Python logging documentation`_ for the whole list of available
-placeholders.
-
-.. _Python logging documentation: https://docs.python.org/2/library/logging.html#logrecord-attributes
+String for formatting log messages. Refer to the
+:ref:`Python logging documentation <logrecord-attributes>` for the qwhole
+list of available placeholders.
 
 .. setting:: LOG_DATEFORMAT
 
@@ -912,10 +909,9 @@ LOG_DATEFORMAT
 Default: ``'%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S'``
 
 String for formatting date/time, expansion of the ``%(asctime)s`` placeholder
-in :setting:`LOG_FORMAT`. Refer to the `Python datetime documentation`_ for the whole list of available
-directives.
-
-.. _Python datetime documentation: https://docs.python.org/2/library/datetime.html#strftime-and-strptime-behavior
+in :setting:`LOG_FORMAT`. Refer to the
+:ref:`Python datetime documentation <strftime-strptime-behavior>` for the
+whole list of available directives.
 
 .. setting:: LOG_FORMATTER
 
diff --git a/docs/topics/spider-middleware.rst b/docs/topics/spider-middleware.rst
index 0e8210130..d49a2209d 100644
--- a/docs/topics/spider-middleware.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/spider-middleware.rst
@@ -140,7 +140,7 @@ object gives you access, for example, to the :ref:`settings <topics-settings>`.
         :type response: :class:`~scrapy.http.Response` object
 
         :param exception: the exception raised
-        :type exception: `Exception`_ object
+        :type exception: :exc:`Exception` object
 
         :param spider: the spider which raised the exception
         :type spider: :class:`~scrapy.spiders.Spider` object
@@ -173,20 +173,16 @@ object gives you access, for example, to the :ref:`settings <topics-settings>`.
         :type spider: :class:`~scrapy.spiders.Spider` object
 
     .. method:: from_crawler(cls, crawler)
-    
+
        If present, this classmethod is called to create a middleware instance
        from a :class:`~scrapy.crawler.Crawler`. It must return a new instance
        of the middleware. Crawler object provides access to all Scrapy core
        components like settings and signals; it is a way for middleware to
        access them and hook its functionality into Scrapy.
-    
+
        :param crawler: crawler that uses this middleware
        :type crawler: :class:`~scrapy.crawler.Crawler` object
 
-
-.. _Exception: https://docs.python.org/2/library/exceptions.html#exceptions.Exception
-
-
 .. _topics-spider-middleware-ref:
 
 Built-in spider middleware reference
diff --git a/docs/topics/spiders.rst b/docs/topics/spiders.rst
index 89609db7d..231db6cea 100644
--- a/docs/topics/spiders.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/spiders.rst
@@ -298,9 +298,7 @@ Keep in mind that spider arguments are only strings.
 The spider will not do any parsing on its own.
 If you were to set the ``start_urls`` attribute from the command line,
 you would have to parse it on your own into a list
-using something like
-`ast.literal_eval <https://docs.python.org/3/library/ast.html#ast.literal_eval>`_
-or `json.loads <https://docs.python.org/3/library/json.html#json.loads>`_
+using something like :func:`ast.literal_eval` or :func:`json.loads`
 and then set it as an attribute.
 Otherwise, you would cause iteration over a ``start_urls`` string
 (a very common python pitfall)
diff --git a/docs/topics/telnetconsole.rst b/docs/topics/telnetconsole.rst
index 47d8d393c..9802a34a2 100644
--- a/docs/topics/telnetconsole.rst
+++ b/docs/topics/telnetconsole.rst
@@ -40,10 +40,10 @@ the console you need to type::
     Connected to localhost.
     Escape character is '^]'.
     Username:
-    Password:  
+    Password:
     >>>
 
-By default Username is ``scrapy`` and Password is autogenerated. The 
+By default Username is ``scrapy`` and Password is autogenerated. The
 autogenerated Password can be seen on Scrapy logs like the example below::
 
     2018-10-16 14:35:21 [scrapy.extensions.telnet] INFO: Telnet Password: 16f92501e8a59326
@@ -63,7 +63,7 @@ Available variables in the telnet console
 =========================================
 
 The telnet console is like a regular Python shell running inside the Scrapy
-process, so you can do anything from it including importing new modules, etc. 
+process, so you can do anything from it including importing new modules, etc.
 
 However, the telnet console comes with some default variables defined for
 convenience:
@@ -89,13 +89,11 @@ convenience:
 +----------------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
 | ``prefs``      | for memory debugging (see :ref:`topics-leaks`)                    |
 +----------------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
-| ``p``          | a shortcut to the `pprint.pprint`_ function                       |
+| ``p``          | a shortcut to the :func:`pprint.pprint` function                  |
 +----------------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
 | ``hpy``        | for memory debugging (see :ref:`topics-leaks`)                    |
 +----------------+-------------------------------------------------------------------+
 
-.. _pprint.pprint: https://docs.python.org/library/pprint.html#pprint.pprint
-
 Telnet console usage examples
 =============================
 
@@ -208,4 +206,3 @@ Default: ``None``
 
 The password used for the telnet console, default behaviour is to have it
 autogenerated
-
diff --git a/scrapy/item.py b/scrapy/item.py
index 1d39b48b2..748368932 100644
--- a/scrapy/item.py
+++ b/scrapy/item.py
@@ -121,9 +121,7 @@ class DictItem(MutableMapping, BaseItem):
         return self.__class__(self)
 
     def deepcopy(self):
-        """Return a `deep copy`_ of this item.
-
-        .. _deep copy: https://docs.python.org/library/copy.html#copy.deepcopy
+        """Return a :func:`~copy.deepcopy` of this item.
         """
         return deepcopy(self)