In this article, we analyse the modal forms sans doute and sin duda. (lit. without doubts or undoubtedly). Despite their formal similarity, they do not always represent the same degree of certainty in French and Spanish. After a detailed analysis of their use in both languages, our conclusions show that sans doute is a probability marker, whereas sin duda is an (almost) certainty marker. After examining the relationship of these modal markers with evidentiality, we underscore the epistemic character of both markers; they are related to belief and subjectivity, thus the nature of certainty that they express is indirect and subjective. Sin duda manifests a higher degree of conviction than sans doute.

on the Spanish TELE5 and on the French channel France2. The interviewees were two political leaders, José María Aznar, Prime Minister of the Spanish Government in Spain, and Jacques Chirac, President of France. This was a few days prior to the date that the Coalition Forces attacked Iraq. We study how the function of inquiry and control is done in these interviews by the television media in each country and the verbal behaviour of both statesmen answering the questions. We also study each governor's discourse of justification. The interviews present a clear parallelism, but the study reveals important differences regarding the rhythm of the exchange and the interlocutive behaviour of the participants. Furthermore, the justifications of the two governors are clearly opposite, as far as their discursive strategies and their conception of politics are concerned. K E Y W O R D S : argument, dialogal, dialogic, discourse analysis, interviews, mass media, point of view, political discourse, verbal interaction

We analyze the Spanish verbal periphrases tienes que + infinitive and debes + infini-tive [you have to + infinitive and you should + infinitive], with a deontic meaning, in an Internet forum. These verbal forms are used to give advice to other Internet users. After analyzing their functions, we reached the conclusion that such periphrases, with deontic value, function as epistemic modals: on the part of the speaker, they imply an axiological evaluation of his or her advice in terms of it being essential and necessary. Its evidential value (in the sense of information validation rather than as a source) derives from two factors. From a pragmatic inference: when a speaker expresses a high degree of certainty, to the extent of presenting an act as a requirement or obligation, he or she must have compelling evidence in order to believe that. And from an argumentative strategy: in order to justify their exhortations, the speakers draw on their personal experience and present themselves as witnesses who guarantee the validity of their recommendations.

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In this article, we perform an evidential analysis of three types of construction taken from essays written by students of French as a foreign language: the shown source, the quoted source and borrowed knowledge. The issue with these constructions, which refer to passages from a book, is knowing the extent to which they have an evidential value because, within the context of our analysis, the source and the knowledge reference overlap. We defend an evidential reading of these segments given their argumentative function in the students' discourse. We perform a pragmatic analysis of these language forms that take into account the parameters of the communicative situation and the type of text that the students have to produce. Our hypothesis is this: the figure of the teacher (who, in this case, is the hearer and the addressee) and his or her instructions have a direct impact on the way in which the student presents his or her knowledge of the book on which he or she is commenting. The analysis of the function of these three forms has also led us to address the issue of the relationship between evidentiality and notions like the reliability and epistemic modality. We conclude that source (evidentiality) is a reliability's character and an epistemic function in the discourse.