How can I get the class of a parent element?
Your code should already work, but it might be more reliable to access the property className instead:
jQuery(function($) {
console.log($('.nav a.current').parent().prop('className'));
});<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.2.4/jquery.min.js"></script>
<div class="nav">
<ul>
<li class="tab1">
<a href="#1" class="current">Welcome</a>
</li>
<li class="tab2">
<a href="#2">About</a>
</li>
<!-- and some lists more -->
</ul>
</div>jQuery(function($) {
console.log($('.nav a.current').parent().prop('className'));
});<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/jquery/2.2.4/jquery.min.js"></script>
<div class="nav">
<ul>
<li class="tab1">
<a href="#1" class="current">Welcome</a>
</li>
<li class="tab2">
<a href="#2">About</a>
</li>
<!-- and some lists more -->
</ul>
</div>This will work:
var currentli = $($('.nav').find('a.current')).parent().attr('class');
console.log(currentli);
I'm simply transforming the found collection into a jQuery object again.
See fiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/RaphaelDDL/wnW4u/
Ps.: If more than one a has class="current", only the first one will be retrieved.