A folk taxonomy is a vernacular naming system, and can be contrasted with scient ific taxonomy.

Folk biological classification is the way peoples describe and or ganize their natural surroundings/the world around them, typically making genero us use of form taxa like "shrubs", "bugs", "ducks", "ungulates" and the likes. A strology is a folk taxonomy, while astronomy uses a scientific classification sy stem, although both involve observations of the stars and celestial bodies and b oth terms seem equally scientific, with the former meaning "the teachings about the stars" and the latter "the rules about the stars". Folk taxonomies are gener ated from social knowledge and are used in everyday speech. They are distinguish ed from scientific taxonomies that claim to be disembedded from social relations and thus objective and universal. Anthropologists have observed that taxonomies are generally embedded in local cu ltural and social systems, and serve various social functions. Arguably, the mos t well-known and influential study of folk taxonomies is ?mile Durkheim's The El ementary Forms of Religious Life. Folk taxonomies exist to allow popular identification of classes of objects, and apply to all areas of human activity. All parts of the world have their own sys tems of naming local plants and animals. These naming systems are a vital aid to survival and include information such as the fruiting patterns of trees and the habits of large mammals. These localised naming systems are folk taxonomies. Th eophrastus recorded evidence of a Greek folk taxonomy for plants, but later form alized botanical taxonomies were laid out in the 18th century by Carolus Linnaeu s. Critics of the concept of "race" in humans argue that race is a folk taxonomy ra ther than a scientific classification.[1] Scientists generally recognize that folk taxonomies conflict at times with Linna ean taxonomy or current interpretations of evolutionary relationships, and can t end to refer to generalized rather than quantitatively informative traits in an organism. Notable folk taxa include Saber-toothed cat.