The relatively new social science named folkbiology is concerned with people’s everyday understanding of the biological world; and in particular with the systems of classification used to distinguish natural phenomena and organisms into separate entities. The essays in this volume address topics across the whole range of folkbiology’s concerns. To what degree are systems of biological classification innate and to what degree learned? Are folk taxonomies merely approximations of scientific taxonomies, or are they fitted for specific social purposes? And are whales in fact fish after all?

MIT Press Ltd | Paperback 510 pp. |ISBN: 9780262631921