Malcolm X and rap music have always fit together like a needle in the groove, connected by struggle, strength and defiance. But three recent episodes involving the use or misuse of Malcolm and other black icons have raised the question: Has rap lost touch with black history?

Chart-topping rapstress Nicki Minaj provoked widespread outrage with an Instagram post featuring one of black history's most poignant images: Malcolm X peering out the window of his home, rifle in hand, trying to defend his wife and children from firebombs while under surveillance by federal agents. Superimposed on the photo: the title of Minaj's new song, which denigrates certain black men and repeats a racial epithet 42 times.

Cristiano Ronaldo scored a late equalizer as Real Madrid avoided a bruising derby defeat at Spanish title rival Atletico Madrid with a 2-2 draw on Sunday.

Ronaldo pounced on a loose ball inside the area to net the 82nd-minute equalizer — his 23rd goal of the season for the league leaders.

There's a whole lot of shakin' going on at the University of Nevada, Reno.

UNR's seismic-simulation facility became the largest in the United States and second largest in the world this week with an expansion that included moving three new 27-ton shake table tops into the school's new Earthquake Engineering Laboratory.

British royals Prince William and wife Kate plan to go jet boating and sailing during an adventurous trip Down Under, according to a Kensington Palace announcement Monday.

The Duke and Duchess of Cambridge, accompanied by 7-month-old son Prince George, plan to spend three weeks in Australia and New Zealand next month.

Ellen DeGeneres' goal of setting a retweet record with her star-studded selfie was achieved before the Oscars telecast was even over.

During a comic bit, the Oscars host prevailed upon actor Bradley Cooper to take a picture with her and several other stars crowding around, including Meryl Streep, Jennifer Lawrence, Kevin Spacey, Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt.

Hollywood named the brutal, unshrinking historical drama "12 Years a Slave" best picture at the 86th annual Academy Awards.

Steve McQueen's slavery odyssey, based on Solomon Northup's 1853 memoir, has been hailed as a landmark corrective to the movie industry's long omission of slavery stories, following years of whiter tales like 1940 best-picture winner "Gone With the Wind."

At least 13 people, including women and children, were killed in an explosion on Sunday as Taliban militants prepared a car bomb in southern Afghanistan, officials said.

The explosives detonated prematurely as they were being placed in a car in a house in Puli Alam, the capital of Logar province, deputy provincial police chief Abdul Wali Toofan told Agence France Presse.

Syrian activists say government airstrikes in a small northwestern town on the border with Turkey have killed at least 13 people.

Activists of the Idlib News group and the British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said two government air attacks on the town of Kfar Tarakhim in the northwest province of Idlib destroyed residential buildings.

The Oscars could be Mexico's big night, with three Mexicans nominated for directing, cinematography and acting.

Except that some in Mexico aren't looking at it that way.

In the early days, you typed in a domain name address to reach a website. Then came the ability to reach websites directly through a search engine. The mobile era brought us phone apps for accessing services without either.

Yet the organization in charge of Internet addresses is pushing a major expansion in domain name suffixes. At least 160 suffixes have been added since October to join the ranks of ".com," ''.org" and scores of country-specific ones such as ".uk" for the United Kingdom. Hundreds of other proposals are being reviewed.