Human discourse is an ongoing project of meaning-making, and the extent to which an individual or a group or category of individuals actually contributes to meaning depends on their ability to get their contributions heard and attended to. The fate of a speaker's contribution is already at issue even before it is uttered – before one can put one's ideas on the floor, one has to be in the situation and the conversation in which it is appropriate to talk about certain things. And once one is in the situation, one has to be able to actually get the idea onto the floor – to make that particular utterance on a particular occasion. The very beginning of the analysis of language and gender, therefore, lies in the division of labor writ large. In the course of the day, who is present where particular situations unfold? What kinds of speech events and activities take place in these situations and who is thus present to participate in them? Who has the right and/or authority to participate in these events and in what ways? Who is entitled to speak and be heeded on what kinds of topics? How does one get one's contribution into the flow of speech? And who will be in a position to follow up that contribution in other situations?