The font style defines how the type should be slanted on the page. The normal style is upright (sometimes called "roman") and is what will display by default if you don't specify a font style.
Italics
This font style is often thought of as the "emphasis" style because the <em> tag is generally represented on screen in italics. But the italics font style is a reference to a typeface that has been slanted to the right and other changes are made to the glyphs of the letters to make them slightly different.
Many font families have an italics version of the font, but as with all Web typography, if your reader does not have the font face in italics, the page will render in unexpected ways. If you are relying on italics for a specific purpose to the content, make sure that you identify that segement of text in other ways in case the italics do not render.
To specify a section of text as italic, use the font-style CSS property. For example:
font-style: italic;Oblique Font Faces
Oblique font faces are also slanted, but unlike italics, the glyphs themselves won't be changed. Oblique font faces are a lot less common than italics, and are most often found on sans-serif fonts.
If you are using oblique fonts in your design, be aware that they are less commonly found on most computers, so be sure to have a backup method to identify the differences in the fonts. In fact, in most situations, the Web browser will display an oblique font in italics if there is no oblique face to use.
To specificy a section of text as oblique, use the font-style CSS property. For example:
font-style: oblique;