The Tortilla Curtain
E839793
The Tortilla Curtain is a 1995 novel by T.C. Boyle that explores immigration, racism, and class conflict in Southern California through the intersecting lives of a wealthy white couple and undocumented Mexican immigrants.
All labels observed (1)
| Label | Occurrences |
|---|---|
| The Tortilla Curtain canonical | 1 |
How this entity was disambiguated
This entity first appeared as the object of triple T10091730 — resolving that mention is where its identity was fixed. The disambiguator weighed these candidate entities and picked the highlighted one (or “None”, minting a new entity). This is how homonymy is resolved: the same surface form can point to different entities.
NED1
Entity disambiguation (via context triple)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Tortilla Curtain Context triple: [T.C. Boyle, notableWork, The Tortilla Curtain]
-
A.
La Frontera
La Frontera is the historical frontier region in southern Chile that was the site of prolonged conflict and cultural interaction between Spanish colonizers and the indigenous Mapuche people.
-
B.
On the Border
"On the Border" is a 1974 rock song by the Eagles, featured on their album of the same name and noted for its blend of country rock and politically tinged lyrics.
-
C.
Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories
Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories is a collection of short stories by Sandra Cisneros that explores the lives, struggles, and identities of Mexican and Mexican American women through lyrical, feminist, and culturally rich narratives.
-
D.
Mexico Trilogy
Mexico Trilogy is a series of stylish, action-packed neo-Western films by Robert Rodriguez that follow interconnected stories of gunslingers and outlaws in Mexico.
-
E.
The Milagro Beanfield War
The Milagro Beanfield War is a 1988 comedy-drama film set in a small New Mexico town, focusing on a local farmer’s fight against powerful developers and government interests.
- F. None of above. chosen
- G. Unsure - the case is ambiguous/there is not enough information to decide.
NED2
Entity disambiguation (via description)
gpt-5-mini-2025-08-07
Target entity: The Tortilla Curtain Target entity description: The Tortilla Curtain is a 1995 novel by T.C. Boyle that explores immigration, racism, and class conflict in Southern California through the intersecting lives of a wealthy white couple and undocumented Mexican immigrants.
-
A.
La Frontera
La Frontera is the historical frontier region in southern Chile that was the site of prolonged conflict and cultural interaction between Spanish colonizers and the indigenous Mapuche people.
-
B.
On the Border
"On the Border" is a 1974 rock song by the Eagles, featured on their album of the same name and noted for its blend of country rock and politically tinged lyrics.
-
C.
Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories
Woman Hollering Creek and Other Stories is a collection of short stories by Sandra Cisneros that explores the lives, struggles, and identities of Mexican and Mexican American women through lyrical, feminist, and culturally rich narratives.
-
D.
Mexico Trilogy
Mexico Trilogy is a series of stylish, action-packed neo-Western films by Robert Rodriguez that follow interconnected stories of gunslingers and outlaws in Mexico.
-
E.
The Milagro Beanfield War
The Milagro Beanfield War is a 1988 comedy-drama film set in a small New Mexico town, focusing on a local farmer’s fight against powerful developers and government interests.
- F. None of above. chosen
Statements (47)
| Predicate | Object |
|---|---|
| instanceOf | novel ⓘ |
| author | T. C. Boyle NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| countryOfOrigin |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| explores |
cultural clashes between Anglo and Mexican communities
ⓘ
economic inequality ⓘ environmental concerns ⓘ suburban fear of crime ⓘ |
| genre |
contemporary fiction
ⓘ
literary fiction ⓘ political novel ⓘ social novel ⓘ |
| hasCharacter |
América Rincón
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
Cándido Rincón NERFINISHED ⓘ Delaney Mossbacher NERFINISHED ⓘ Kyra Mossbacher NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| hasForm | prose ⓘ |
| hasISBN | 9780140238280 ⓘ |
| hasMotif |
accidents and random events
ⓘ
coyotes ⓘ walls and gates ⓘ wilderness versus development ⓘ |
| hasReception | critically acclaimed ⓘ |
| hasSubject |
border control
ⓘ
gated communities ⓘ liberal hypocrisy ⓘ undocumented immigrants in the United States ⓘ |
| language | English ⓘ |
| literaryMovement | contemporary American literature ⓘ |
| mainTheme |
border politics
ⓘ
class conflict ⓘ immigration ⓘ racism ⓘ the American Dream NERFINISHED ⓘ xenophobia ⓘ |
| narrativePerspective | third-person narration ⓘ |
| narrativeStructure | multiple perspectives ⓘ |
| pageCountApproximate | 350 ⓘ |
| publicationYear | 1995 ⓘ |
| publisher |
The Viking Press
ⓘ
surface form:
Viking Press
|
| setInState | California NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| settingCountry |
United States of America
ⓘ
surface form:
United States
|
| settingLocation |
Southern California
NERFINISHED
ⓘ
Topanga Canyon NERFINISHED ⓘ |
| timePeriod | 1990s ⓘ |
| titleRefersTo | metaphorical barrier between the United States and Mexico ⓘ |
| usedIn |
courses on immigration studies
ⓘ
university literature courses ⓘ |
How these facts were elicited
The pipeline generated the facts above by prompting gpt-5.1 with this entity's name + description and the instruction below.
Instruction
You are a knowledge base construction expert. Given a subject entity and a description of it, return factual statements that you know for the subject as a JSON list of dictionaries(triples), where keys must be "subject", "predicate" and "object". The number of facts may be very high, between 25 to 50 or more, for very popular subjects. For less popular subjects, the number of facts can be very low, like 5 or 10. # Requirements - If you don't know the subject at all, return an empty list. - If the subject is not a named entity, return an empty list. - Include at least one triple where predicate is "instanceOf". - Do not get too wordy. - Separate several objects into multiple triples with one object.
Input
Subject: The Tortilla Curtain Description of subject: The Tortilla Curtain is a 1995 novel by T.C. Boyle that explores immigration, racism, and class conflict in Southern California through the intersecting lives of a wealthy white couple and undocumented Mexican immigrants.
Referenced by (1)
Full triples — surface form annotated when it differs from this entity's canonical label.