African American

The trouble began soon after they arrived. The black family - a mother, three teenage children and a 10-year-old boy - moved into a little yellow home in Compton over Christmas vacation. When a friend came to visit, four men in a black SUV pulled up and called him a "nigger," saying black people were barred from the neighborhood, according to Los Angeles County sheriff's deputies. They jumped out, drew a gun on him and beat him with metal pipes. It was just the beginning of what detectives said was a campaign by a Latino street gang to force an African American family to leave.

The life and career of President Obama will become a major part of the Smithsonian's National Museum of African American History and Culture. The museum, which is scheduled to open in 2015, has been collecting Obama-related artifacts since his nomination as the 2008 Democratic candidate, according to reports.   The museum began construction in 2012 and will be completed in 2015. The president attended the groundbreaking ceremony of the museum and delivered an address. At the time, the museum had an estimated price tag of $500 million.

As the nation watches President Obama take the oath of office Monday for his second term, Americans may notice a more mature (and grayer) version of the hopeful candidate depicted in Shepard Fairey's ubiquitous 2008 campaign poster. Since then, Obama's likeness has been cartooned, lampooned and masterfully crafted by artists of varying inclinations. Although the official presidential portrait will not be revealed until the end of his second term, some interesting interpretations are already on view.

It's a tidy coincidence that Jackie Lacey, newly elected as Los Angeles County's first female and first African American district attorney, is a graduate of the city's Susan Miller Dorsey High School, named for L.A.'s first female schools superintendent. Lacey was sworn in in December, and she's now ensconced in the D.A.'s offices on the criminal courthouse's 18th floor, where her picture will join those of 160 years' worth of white men who've held the title, among them Gen. George S. Patton's father.

Despite her rivals raising more money and garnering more attention in Los Angeles' mayoral race, City Councilwoman Jan Perry said Saturday she should not be counted out. “People focus on money as a measure of status, and if this was a race just about money, then you might as well hold it today and elect the one who has the most money. But I think this is not about that,” Perry told The Times. “It's about the democratic process and about empowering people and energizing them and getting them to turn out and whether or not you have a message and a record and whether or not you connect with people.” Perry recalled her first run for office, and how the conventional wisdom was that she had no shot at success.

"Zero Dark Thirty," Kathryn Bigelow's chronicle of the search for terrorist Osama bin-Laden, continued its winning ways Sunday evening when it was named best film of 2012 by the African-American Film Critics Association. The film, which opens Wednesday, has already won best film honors from the New York Film Critics Circle and the National Board of Review, and it received best film nominations last week for the Critics' Choice Movie Awards and the Golden Globes. But it was Ava DuVernay's drama about how a marriage is affected when the husband goes to prison, "Middle of Nowhere," that was the big winner Sunday, receiving four awards: actress for Emayatzy Corinealdi, screenplay for DuVernay, independent film and music for Kathryn Bostic & Morgan Rhodes.

The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission has found that retailer Wet Seal Inc. discriminated against a former African American store manager. It's just the latest problem plaguing the struggling Foothill Ranch company, which in the space of five months has fired its chief executive, overseen a board overhaul and revamped its strategy to bolster flagging sales. Now, the federal agency tasked with enforcing laws against workplace discrimination has determined that Nicole Cogdell, a former manager of a Wet Seal store in Pennsylvania, was "subjected to a hostile work environment" because of her race.

The Tucson Unified School District was forced to shut down its Mexican American Studies program earlier this year after Arizona Supt. of Public Instruction John Huppenthal threatened to withhold millions of dollars in state aid. Huppenthal said the program violated a state law banning classes that promote "racial resentment," encourage "ethnic solidarity" or advocate the overthrow of the United States. Fortunately, Huppenthal's attempt to bully the district with this obnoxious law wasn't entirely successful.

Mitt Romney said Wednesday that his loss to President Obama was due in large part to his rival's strategy of giving "gifts" during his first term to three groups that were pivotal in the results of last week's election: African Americans, Latinos and young voters. "The Obama campaign was following the old playbook of giving a lot of stuff to groups that they hoped they could get to vote for them and be motivated to go out to the polls, specifically the African American community, the Hispanic community and young people," Romney told hundreds of donors during a telephone town hall Wednesday.

NHRA top-fuel driver Antron Brown became the first African American to win a major motor racing title Sunday, leaning on the big points lead he took into a race day that ended prematurely. Brown was beaten in the first round of Sunday eliminations at the Auto Club Finals in Pomona, then waited more than six hours before seven-time top-fuel champion Tony Schumacher's furious rally was extinguished by Brandon Bernstein in the final. It was Bernstein's first win of the season, and it left Schumacher seven points shy of Brown - who won five top-fuel events this year.