People often directly associate the name of a country with that of a language. French is the language of France, English that of England, etc. But in many cases the name of the country bears no relation to the name of the language or languages spoken in that country. There is no such thing as a Belgian, a Swiss, an Austrian or Yugoslavian language. Belgium doesn't has an own language. It has three official languages: Dutch, French and German. Besides this there are plenty of non-official regional languages and dialects (West-Flemish, Brabantish, Lumburgish, Picard, Walloon, Luxemburgish, etc.).

Some towns in Belgium have a bilingual statute. This is the case with the capital Brussel/Bruxelles, that has two official languages: French and Dutch. Dutch is used by a minority of the people in Bruxelles/Brussel. In the past it was a city where Dutch was spoken, but today the majority in this city speaks French.

The differences between Flemish (Belgian) and Hollandish Dutch, between Walloon (Belgian) and "French" French, and between East-Belgian and "German" German are the same as those between British and American English: other words, others accents, other sayings,... but fundamentally the same language.

There are sometimes political frictions between Dutch- and Frenchspeaking Belgians, although these frictions are on a low level. The origin of these frictions was the fact that French was a long time the language of the ruling class in Belgium. This Belgian bourgeoisie considered Dutch as an inferior language for the poor Flemish plebs, while those Flemish Belgians considered French as the language of the oppressor and the rich bourgeoisie. Dutch was a discriminated language. In the 19th century Dutchspeaking Belgians were sometimes innocently sentenced to death because they couldn't defend themselves in French which was the official language on tribunals, police and other administrations. So, the Flemish language struggle wasn't only an emancipation struggle for a language and its culture, but a class struggle too. Besides that the Frenchspeaking Belgians were afraid to be minorized in Belgium.
Even now a lot of Dutch- and Frenchspeaking Belgians feel antipathy for the other language, which doesn't mean automatically they feel antipathy too for the person who speak this other language. Generally the relationships of ordinary Dutch- and Frenchspeaking Belgians with each other are good, and anyway better than the relationships between Dutch- and Frenchspeaking Belgian politicians. But the result is that lots of young Belgians know better English (which is the most used language in the common music they like and is the international trade and computer language) than the other big language of their country. And like this language isn't an official language of Belgium, it's a relatively neutral language for them. So, young Belgians with different native tongues start communicating more and more in English with each other.

The multilingual structure of Belgium and the important trade between Belgium and its foreign countries makes it necessary for Belgians to know as much different languages as possible. Most Belgian bosses ask their laborers to know at least 3 different languages. And if they can choose between someone who knows 3 languages and someone else who knows 5 languages, it is most likely for them to give the job to the person that knows 5 languages. Especially dutchspeaking Belgians feel this economical pressure because Dutch is a minority language in Europe. The frenchspeaking Belgians feeled this economical pressure long time less because French is a big language in Europe and in the world.

This economical necessity of language knowledge and the different languages in Belgium itself give language lessons are on a high level in Belgium (especially in the Dutchspeaking part). Also the different local dialects encourage language knowledge like these dialects are spoken at home while education at school is given into the local official standard language (Dutch, French or German).