However, it is often desirable to consider syntactic constituents of subphrases, . the hierarchical phrase X → X 1 for X 2 , X 2 de X 1 can be applied to both of the following strings in Figure 1 “A request for a purchase of shares” “filed for bankruptcy”, and get the following translation, respectively “goumai gufen de shenqing” “pochan de shenqing”.