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Is the `xml:lang` attribute required (in addition to the HTML `lang` attribute) when specifying the language of an XHTML element?

Answer 1

+1 A:

According to the XHTML 1.0 spec: yes, use both.

Doesn't say why though.

Dive Into Accessibility's language page says the same thing, as mentioned in Rahul's answer to a similar question.

Paul D. Waite 2009-05-01 16:39:52

+1 Good question, good answer.

Andrew Hare 2009-05-01 16:40:29

Aw, thank you! Tiny thing, but it was bothering me.

Paul D. Waite 2009-05-01 16:44:54

Answer 2

+2 A:

If you're sending the file with the text/html MIME type, you should, because you're trying to use both HTML and XHTML. (Browsers will only look at the lang, though.)

If you're using the correct MIME type (application/xhtml+xml), on the other hand, only xml:lang="" is necessary, if (correctly) pointing out that you're using HTML, with an HTML doctype, you just need lang="".

Ms2ger 2009-05-01 18:58:04

Thanks man, I think that makes sense. So the idea is that if the document is parsed by a parser that only understands XML (or at least doesn’t know about the particular semantics of XHTML), it still knows that that element is in Spanish.

Paul D. Waite 2009-05-10 21:10:44

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Is the `xml:lang` attribute required (in addition to the HTML `lang` attribute) when specifying the language of an XHTML element?

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