Virginia Ballance

University of The Bahamas · University Libraries

This study analyses the treatment of Bahamian women in heterosexual relationships by their intimate partners focusing on instances of sexual and psychological abuse. An internet survey obtained information from 464 married and 1,264 unmarried women currently in intimate relationships with men. Married women were more likely than unmarried women in...

This paper presents incidental data on sweethearting from a study on sexual violence in intimate-partner relationships between men and women in The Bahamas. Females participating in the study reported male infidelity to be common (with about 20% and possibly as many as about 50% of men being unfaithful) in both unmarried and married relationships....

This paper describes the treatment of heterosexual men in The Bahamas by their intimate partners. An internet study surveyed 335 married and 922 unmarried men in The Bahamas who were currently in intimate relationships with women. The study found that behaviours of concern were inflicted by women on their male partners both inside and outside of ma...

In 2022, University of The Bahamas partnered with the Bahamas Crisis Centre in a series of lectures to increase public awareness about gender-based violence. In support of this initiative a collection of papers has been pulled together in a book entitled “Sexual Violence in The Bahamas” which will serve as an introduction for those who wish to lear...

Rape has been a concern in The Bahamas and the law recognizes rape outside of marriage as being a criminal offence. However, the so-called "marital rape exception" means that rape within a marriage is not treated as a crime. This has resulted in several national conversations about changes to the law. This study focuses on established (long-term) r...

Corporal punishment is a common means of disciplining children in Bahamian homes. Previous studies in The Bahamas have linked the justification for its use with religious beliefs. An Internet survey employing a snowball sampling method resulted in 1,570 persons participating in a study designed to focus on the association between biblical influence...

Rape has been a concern in The Bahamas and the law recognizes rape outside of marriage as being a criminal offence. However, the so-called "marital rape exception" means that rape within a marriage is not a crime. This has resulted in several national conversations about changed to the law. This study focuses on established (long-term) relationship...

This case study does not attempt to give a comprehensive list of UB responses to Hurricane Dorian; rather, it attempts to give a larger picture of its efforts, which are also embedded in an even larger picture of the Government of The Bahamas’ relief efforts. A case study within this case study focuses on the library as it is a warning of the irrep...

In an Internet-based study, 1,583 Bahamian adults living in The Bahamas were asked about their knowledge, attitudes, and practices relating to corporal punishment. The study confirmed the attitudes and practices towards corporal punishment reported in other studies. Both male and female respondents were physically punished as children (92.4% of mal...

This article describes the development of the Research Edge Forum at the College of The Bahamas/University of The Bahamas from 2000 to 2020.

This case study does not attempt to give a comprehensive list of UB’s responses to COVID-19 rather it attempts to give a board overview of its efforts, which are also embedded within the boarder frame of Emergency Orders issued by the Government of The Bahamas. Two specific areas examined within this case study, which focus on library services and...

This paper reports some of the qualitative responses obtained from a recent study on KAP with respect to the use of corporal punishment on children in The Bahamas.

Incidental findings from a study on knowledge, attitudes and practices on corporal punishment on children in the Covid-19 pandemic of 2020 in The Bahamas show that children were at greater risk of psychological aggression when their caregivers were more concerned about the Covid-19 pandemic, than those caregivers who were unconcerned about the pand...

This review of the literature concerning corporal punishment arising from The Bahamas enables us to identify several strands: (1) corporal punishment is an historically accepted method of controlling children which only recently has been called into question; (2) school teachers have typically seen corporal punishment as a useful classroom manageme...

Gender-based violence continues to be a source of concern in The Bahamas. Structural inequality between the sexes is present in the law and cultural attitudes can work to circumscribe the expectations of women. Such attitudes are reinforced through messages from various sources. This paper presents the results from an Internet-based survey of 1,279...

An objective for the compilation of this bibliography is to provide a list of resources that address substance and drug abuse in The Bahamas and the wider Caribbean from its beginnings in the 1980s to present day by medical professionals, academics, policy makers and government officials. Therefore, research was conducted to compile as full a bibli...

This monograph brings together research undertaken by the College of The Bahamas on violence in The Bahamas. These articles are intended to inform all those interested in furthering their understanding of the complexity of the subject.

Editorial for Volume 21, 2015

Starting in 2014, an oral history project focusing on nurses, nursing practice, and nursing education in The Bahamas during the post-World War II era was established in the Hilda Bowen Library of the College of The Bahamas. Conceived as being a partnership between the Library and College’s “From Dat Time”: Oral and Public History Institute, the pro...

The College of The Bahamas has published 20 volumes of a research journal since 1980. The journal has had a stop-and-start history, undergone three name changes, and in 2008 made a major move from a print to an online environment. This overview of publishing a research journal at the College of The Bahamas traces its history and evolution through t...

In the first decade following Bahamian Independence in 1973, registered nurse education transformed from a professional training programme offered by the Ministry of Health’s Department of Nursing Education into an academic discipline offered at The College of The Bahamas. The College of The Bahamas began offering an Associate of Arts degree in Nur...

From its establishment in 1974, administrators of the College of The Bahamas have taken the provision of library services seriously, realizing that any tertiary-level institution requires a strong library collection to assure its credibility as an academic institution. The library system of The College of The Bahamas consists of three libraries: th...

Healthcare in The Bahamas traces the development of healthcare in The Bahamas over the last 200 years. Only in the last 40 of those years was the nation not a British colony. The nation's major health challenges throughout the Colonial era and beyond are described.

Discovery of a hitherto unknown printed catalogue of the collection of the Public Library in Nassau, Bahamas published in 1862 has given library historians a glimpse at the type of books and periodicals available to residents of Nassau during the first decades after emancipation. An analysis of the library’s collection may help to understand the ro...

An album of photographs with accompanying stories about pot cakes, the "national" dog of the Bahamas - a mixed up mongrel of multiple origins.

This bibliography was compiled to bring together books, scholarly articles, governmental reports and biographical accounts relating to migration of Bahamians to the United States on The Contract between 1943 and 1965. It is intended to supplement the paper by Thompson that is published in this volume of the International Journal of Bahamian Studies...

Editoral for the inaugural volume of the International Journal of Bahamian Studies.

FreeForAll is an international collaboration of libraries whose mission is to provide underserved nations with health science journal articles for free and to foster lending between nations through the creation of a database of international libraries’ (non–North American) holdings.

Haitian nationals have been migrating to and settling in The Bahamas for hundreds of years. However the presence of Haitians in The Bahamas has been an ever-increasing cause for concern. In 1963 the Haitian community accounted for 3.2% of the population; in 2000 it represented 7.1% and was numerically the largest migrant group in The Bahamas. The...

Review of two books: Breaking the Glass Ceiling: the Stories of Three Caribbean Nurses by Jocelyn Hezekiah. (University of the West Indies Press, 2000). Trailblazers in Nursing Education: a Caribbean Perspective by Hermi Hyacinth Hewitt (Canoe Press, 2002).

This monograph provides an overview of the developments in public library service in the Bahamian archipelago, from the establishment of the Nassau Public Library in 1837 to the Long Island Public Library and Museum in May 2000.

The National Library of Canada's main mandate is to acquire, catalogue, and promote Canadians regardless of language or place of publication. Since Canada has two official languages, English and French, the National Library aspires to bilingual bibliographic control. Technological advances link bilingual authority files and allow a name-specific us...