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Semantic Markup in HTML5 - 6
Structure: Sectioning Content
<article>
The article element represents a component of a page that consists of a self-contained
composition in a document, page, application, or site and that is intended to be independently
distributable or reusable, e.g. in syndication. This could be a forum post, a magazine or
newspaper article, a Web log entry, a user-submitted comment, an interactive widget or gadget, or
any other independent item of content.
<section>
The section element represents a generic document or application section. A section, in this
context, is a thematic grouping of content, typically with a heading. Examples of sections would
be chapters, the tabbed pages in a tabbed dialog box, or the numbered sections of a thesis. A
Web site's home page could be split into sections for an introduction, news items, contact
information.
When determining if you should put content in a <section> element, ask yourself "Is all of this
content related?" If yes, use <section>, if not, use <div>.
What about <div>? "The section element is not a generic container element. When an element is
needed only for styling purposes or as a convenience for scripting, authors are encouraged to use
the div element instead." Some examples: A container for all page content, styling the introductory
paragraph of an article.
Why is there no <content> element? "The first piece of content that's not in a <header>, <nav>,
<aside> or <footer> is the beginning of the main content, regardless of whether it's contained in an
<article>, a <div>, or whether it is a direct descendent of the <body> element." - pg, 9, Introducing
HTML5
When to not use <section>:
•
Don’t use it just as hook for styling or scripting; that’s a div
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Don’t use it if article, aside or nav is more appropriate
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Don’t use it unless there is naturally a heading at the start of the section
•
Use the article element instead of the section element when it would make sense to syndicate
the contents of the element.
http://html5doctor.com/the-section-element
<footer>
The footer element represents a footer for its nearest ancestor sectioning content or sectioning
root element. A footer typically contains information about its section such as who wrote it, links to
related documents, copyright data, and the like. Footers don’t necessarily have to appear at the
end of a section, though they usually do. When the footer element contains entire sections, they
represent appendices, indexes, long colophons, verbose license agreements, and other such
