An immigration advocacy group has encouraged undocumented immigrants, currently living in the U.S., to "use the power of the story" and to speak publicly about their immigration status.

In a project led by José Antonio Vargas, a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist who revealed his status in a 2011 New York Times Magazine essay, the campaign gives people a chance to upload videos or pictures to a website that asks them to "define American" in 1,000 or fewer characters. Undocumented immigrants and their allies are invited to share their experiences.

"I have outed myself twice in my life," Vargas told reporters when he launched his project on July 1. "The first time was when I was in high school and Ellen DeGeneres' coming out on the cover of Time magazine was a big inspiration for why I did that."

The term "coming out" -- a shortened version of "coming out of the closet" -- is often used as a figure of speech for lesbian, gay, bisexual and, transgender people's self-disclosure of their sexual orientation, and DeGeneres was featured on a landmark April 14, 1997, "Yep, I'm Gay" Time cover.

"More than a decade later, I outed myself as undocumented," Vargas explained. "And the goal of that, and the goal of having Define American, is, How do we use these stories -- individual stories -- to tell the universal truth about the immigrant experience in this country? About the fact that we're not criminals. About the fact that we're not taking away from this country but contributing to it."

In his New York Times Magazine essay, titled "My Life as an Undocumented Immigrant," Vargas shared his experience growing up in the U.S. and revealed personal details such as the documents -- a fake green card, passport and driver's license -- he used to remain in the country.

"I've decided to come forward, own up to what I've done, and tell my story to the best of my recollection," he wrote. "I don't know what the consequences will be of telling my story."