lang property - CSS Reference

lang property CSS Reference

Definition and Usage

The :lang CSS pseudo-class matches elements based on the language the element is determined to be in. In HTML, the language is determined by a combination of the lang attribute, the <meta> element, and possibly by information from the protocol (such as HTTP headers). For other document types there may be other document methods for determining the language.

Acceptable language-code strings are specified in the HTML 4.0 specification.

Syntax

element:lang(language-code) { style properties }

Examples

In this example, the lang selector is used to match on the parent of a quote element using child selectors. Its not meant to demonstrate the only way to do this, or even the correct way (which would depend on the type of document). Note, Unicode values are used to specify special quote characters.

:lang(en) > Q { quotes: '\201C' '\201D' '\2018' '\2019'; }
:lang(fr) > Q { quotes: '« ' ' »'; }
:lang(de) > Q { quotes: '»' '«' '\2039' '\203A'; }

...where...

  <div lang="fr"><q>This French quote has a <q>nested</q> quote.</q></div>
  <div lang="de"><q>This German quote has a <q>nested</q> quote.</q></div>
  <div lang="en"><q>This English quote has a <q>nested</q> quote.</q></div>

... should look like ...
«This French quote has a «nested» quote.»
»This German quote has a ‹nested› quote.«
“This English quote has a ‘nested’ quote.”