superordinate category
a high-level category that subsumes a number of basic-level categories. For example, animal is a superordinate category including the basic-level categories cat, fish, elephant, and so on. A superordinate category is usually characterized by (a) low levels of resemblance between members and (b) fundamental differences between its members and those of other categories (e.g., an elephant is not much like a fish, but both are very different from a tree).