an empirical method for the identification of covert categories in ethnobiology¹

Individual variation in plant knowledge in a New Guinea Highlands community is discussed in terms of its manifestation in plant name lexicon, folk taxonomy, and plant identifications. A method is proposed for the tentative determination of unnamed conceptual groupings of plants on the basis of the patterning of informants' disagreements in plant naming tasks. The method should be generally applicable In ethnobiological research, and especially useful where techniques which require literacy are impracticable .