《新的意义方式：应用语言学的新挑战》是韩礼德在1990年第九届世界应用语言学大会上宣读的论文，同年出版于《应用语言学期刊》第六卷第7至36页。韩礼德回顾了历届世界应用语言学大会主题的变化，引入了语言政策与语言规划这一新兴议题，他指出语法很难被规划，由此过渡到了对语言进化过程的探讨。在他看来，语言同时扮演三个角色：现实的一部分、现实的塑造者以及现实的隐喻。而应用语言学的任务是解释语法构建现实的方式，即语法如何进化为人类用以构建经验的资源。在分析了语言规划、科学话语语域、语言与偏见等领域所面临的语言困境后，他认为这些社会问题和政治问题也都是语言的问题。他主张人类应当反思语言构建世界的方式，来应对诸如阶级主义、增长主义等威胁。该译文是《新的意义方式：应用语言学的新挑战》系列译文之一。

"New Ways of Meaning: A Challenge to Applied Linguistics" is a paper presented by M.A.K. Halliday on the Ninth World Congress in 1990 and was first published in the sixth volume of Journal of Applied Linguistics (pp. 7-36) in the same year. Having reviewed the changes in the themes of previous congresses, Halliday started with one major concern of applied linguistics, namely, language policy and planning. As grammar is not a designed system, he then illustrated different views on the evolution of language. From his point of view, language is a part of reality, a shaper of reality, and a metaphor for reality. The task for applied linguistics is to interpret the grammatical construction of reality, that is, how language evolved as the resource whereby human beings construe experience. Halliday therefore discussed the problematic language in several spheres, including language planning, the register of scientific discourse, and language and prejudice. He pointed out that such social and political issues are also linguistic ones. He ended up with urging human beings reflect on the way that language construes the world, in order to cope with menaces such as classicism and growthism. This is the first part of "New Ways of Meaning: A Challenge to Applied Linguistics".