Jquery and PHP help..

[eluser]OES[/eluser]
An easy way would be to add ID's to your links.

Code:

foreach( $partners as $p_field) {

      print "<span class=\"partners\" id=\"$p_field_name\"><a href="">$p_field->name</a></span>";
  }

// script

$('document').ready(function(){
     $(".partners").click(function(e) {
       e.preventDefault();
       var clicked = this.id;            
       $('.detail_dialog').dialog('open');
     });
});

Then in this example clicked will hold the ID of the clicked link.

Hope this helps.