Gossip is a means of bonding, of chit chat or conversation that is going to build trust between members of a group. And this potential evolutionary benefit has been backed up by quite a few pieces of research in recent years. Gossip is also uniquely important for women because traditionally women haven't had a major prominent voice in society or in public places. So they have employed gossip in previous decades and previous centuries as a way of inserting their opinion in a way that was deemed acceptable.