Get parents of child for CSS

Question

I was wondering if there is a quick way to get the right tree for a child in HTML to add CSS

<div>
  <div>
      <div> 
          <ul>
              <li>
                  <i>
                     <a href="#" class="test"> </a>
                  </i>
               </li>
            </ul>
        </div>
    </div>
</div>

If I want to edit the anchor item without adding a new CSS class for it, how to can I get his parents (this example is simple but I guess you got my point)

 <div>
      <div>
          <div> 
              <ul>
                  <li>
                      <i>