Launched in 2005, the Việt Nam Literature Project publishes Vietnamese literature in America to help young people there to understand their own place in a world that includes Việt Nam. Its vision is a democratic dialogue between writers and research specialists and teachers, students, and readers about what Việt Nam means to people's lives in the United States. VNLP believes that the command of inward vision and gritty personal experience found in imaginative literature offers a royal road to understanding the social realities of the people who have played so great a role in the life of the American nation. The project presents compelling works of Vietnamese literature at no charge on the Internet in English translation, with supporting materials aimed at young people, especially high school and college students in the United States. Every March, June, September and December, VNLP releases attractive and entertaining works of literature by three different Vietnamese authors at its website, where it provides active support to teachers and students from research specialists on those authors, all without charge. VNLP promotes literature on its website with print advertising and a media campaign aimed at reaching the general public, and by visits to schools, colleges and community centres to speak with teachers and students about their needs for Vietnamese literature. It expects to hear from the children and grandchildren of war veterans and of those who fought against the war. These often were the same people, since the war in Việt Nam not only tore American society apart, but also split many families and individuals in half. VNLP also expects to hear from the children and grandchildren of the Vietnamese who have made a new life in the United States. The war that unified Việt Nam ripped them out of that nation and made them Americans, often curious about where they came from. It expects to hear from people too various to anticipate. VNLP will investigate the divides in our world that linger from the birth of modern Việt Nam by putting Vietnamese literature out in the public eye, and then talking with the people who show up to use it. VNLP will work with them all as it develops new units of literature to launch on its website.