The article "The language divide at the heart of a split that is tearing Belgium apart," as is implied by the title, discusses how language threatens to tear the nation of Belgium into two. It describes Belgium's situations as that of "linguistic apartheid," in which the Dutch-speaking Flemings from the North are contesting with the French-speaking Walloons from the South. It describes how Flemish separatism is becoming more prevalent in mainstream society and thus something that must be seriously considered by Belgium's citizens. In a science playground in a town 20 minutes north of Brussels, there is no mention of Belgium. The playground teaches children, "making education fun," but does so exclusively in Dutch. Moreover, it tells only of statistics of Flanders. This manifestation of Flemish separatism further demonstrates how it is ingraining itself into its citizens minds.

Language, through this article, is again seen to be a very powerful political force--one that can unite or, in this case, divide a group of people. It can determine how nations and their borders are situated geographically. However, is it just language that exclusively serves to divide the nation? The article also mentions ways in which the two regions are different including voting tendencies and the relative prosperity of their people. So, in this case, is language solely used to distinguish between the two already different regions or does it have a role in causing the differences between the two? It would be interesting to look into the elements of both the French and Dutch languages and see if either have implications that can cause such differences.