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In the United States, educational publishers organize high school literature anthologies either by themes or chronological period (often grade 11 is an American literature survey and grade 12 is British literature, with world literature mixed into all levels). One of our major goals is to reflect the racial and ethnic heritages of students. Representation is determined by broad categories rather than by specific countries; for example, Korean literature falls under the category of Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI). However, in a school district such as Los Angeles, which has a large population of Korean Americans, teachers probably supplement the curriculum with Korean literature.

World poetry in our programs is usually paired with English-language poetry on a similar theme or topic. In general we prefer looser translations over more literal translations that sound stilted in English. Since haiku are popular in the United States, we might be interested in pairing a haiku with a sijo poem.

Fiction in translation is less common. In earlier grades the most likely Korean fiction to appear in our programs would be folk tales, but in high school we are more likely to choose realistic fiction with a teenage protagonist or a popular genre such as science fiction. Nonfiction should be about topics that are of particular interest for American teenagers; for example, Korean nonfiction might address K-pop or video gaming.

Publishers need to negotiate a complex set of licensing rights for the selections we choose, so it doesn't matter whether a translation is free to read online. We work with either the original publisher of the selection or with the author's agent; if a translation is posted by an individual without such representation, it may be too difficult for us to complete the agreement within our tight publishing deadlines.