The Vietnamese alphabet created by Portuguese Jesuit missionaries replaced chữ Nôm as the preferred way to record Vietnamese literature from 1920s onward. While Chinese characters are still used for decorative, historic and ceremonial value and as symbols of good luck, chữ Nôm has fallen out of mainstream use in modern Vietnam. The task of studying and translating Vietnamese texts written in chữ Nôm to the Vietnamese alphabet is conducted in the Institute of Hán-Nôm Studies at Hanoi.