Answer

Many Flamingants used terms such as “race”, “stock” or “lineage” (in Dutch: “ras”, “stam”, “geslacht”). The use of such terms indicates that Flamingants imagined ´the Flemish people´ as an entity existing by itself, with what differentiates Flemings from others being considered as natural and immutable. Partly as a result of the growing popularity of the Darwinian ideas after 1880, the belief in the existence of races became more widespread. It was only after the Second World War when the word “race” disappeared from political discourse in Europe.

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