When President Barack Obama got to Question No. 9 on the 2010 Census, he did what mixed-race respondents nationwide were asked to do: pare down and define his complex racial background by checking all the boxes he saw fit.

Dr. Edmond Hewlett had seen his fair share of teeth over the course of two days of double shifts at the free medical clinic at the Los Angeles Memorial Sports Arena, but one set stood out.

Looking down from the hilltop of her family’s San Diego home, Monica Hernandez can see the sweep of the Tijuana skyline.

As his tightening quads pushed through the last eight miles of the Los Angeles Marathon, Kellen Jones’ mind was focused on one thing.

Thirty or 40 years ago, the textbook for an evolutionary biology class would be thick with facts on the fossil record, comparative anatomy and taxonomy.

About a month ago, Professor Robin Derby arranged a trip to the Haitian-Dominican border to collect Haitian narratives for an extended research project on the “loup-garou,” the shapeshifting were-creature of Caribbean supernatural folklore.

While Twitter users busied their fingers last week with tweets about the American Dialect Society’s selection of “Google” as word of the decade, English professor Donka Minkova, a member of the society for 25 years, lamented the fate of a word she believes should have been a contender: Sudoku, the popular Japanese number puzzle.

Two years ago, Professor Wellford “Buzz” Wilms met and became fast friends with Agustin Roberto “Bobby” Salcedo, a first-year doctoral student in the Educational Leadership Program.

Last week, Thomas DeGravel and Omar Qureshi looked down from Sproul Hall to see Covel Commons surrounded by student protesters, some throwing bottles and rocks at the police.

Lorenzo Perillo sat in the middle of the intersection of Wilshire and Westwood boulevards Thursday and refused to move for the red Mazda Miata that beeped at him.