Understanding elephants

Have you heard the story of the blind men and the elephant? I don't plan to relate it, others have done a grand job already. Please take a moment to read it if you don't know it.

It came to mind when I was reading some papers for a research project I'm working on. I plan to study a community of scientists, (amongst other activities) and I have been looking for previous work and methods. It seems that there are many methods. One thing the people I'm reading agree on is that even while revealing something, each method excludes more than it reveals. While some arguements will no doubt continue on which is the best method, and other researchers plan to continue to apply their prefered method regardless of its limitations, I plan to ask seven (no mistake) blind men to tell me how this community communicates. That's the way I hope to understand my elephant.