LaToya Howard, better known under the name LaToya Forever, is a Canadian

YouTube personality A YouTuber is an online personality and/or influencer who produces videos on the video-sharing platform YouTube, typically posting to their personal YouTube channel. The term was first used in the English language in 2006. Influence Influent ...

and author, best known for her eponymous YouTube channel as well as her video blog channel "LaToya's Life". In 2012, she was the official Vibe TV host at the

American Music Awards The American Music Awards (AMAs) is an annual American music awards show, generally held in the fall, created by Dick Clark in 1973 for ABC when the network's contract to air the Grammy Awards expired, and currently produced by Dick Clark Produc ...

and in 2015 and 2017 she participated in the

Buffer Festival Buffer Festival is an international digital video festival, held annually in Toronto, Ontario. The festival, founded in 2013 by Corey Vidal, Corrado Coia, and Samantha Fall of the ApprenticeA YouTube channel, showcases the talent of online video ...

. Her self-named main channel on YouTube has more than 1 million subscribers with more than 125 million views. Her debut book, an autobiography titled "LaToya's Life: Uncut Mishaps of a YouTube Star", was released on November 8, 2016.

Early life

LaToya Howard was born in the

Toronto Toronto ( ; or ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Ontario. With a recorded population of 2,794,356 in 2021, it is the most populous city in Canada and the fourth most populous city in North America. The city is the ancho ...

suburb of

Scarborough Scarborough or Scarboro may refer to: People * Scarborough (surname) * Earl of Scarbrough Places Australia * Scarborough, Western Australia, suburb of Perth * Scarborough, New South Wales, suburb of Wollongong * Scarborough, Queensland, su ...

, daughter of professional baseball player

Nigel Wilson Nigel Edward Wilson (born January 12, 1970) is a Canadian former Major League Baseball player from Oshawa, Ontario. He played for the Florida Marlins, Cincinnati Reds, and Cleveland Indians. He also spent six highly successful seasons in Nippo ...

and Debbie Howard, both of Trinidadian descent. Howard has seven younger siblings. Around the time LaToya was 11–14 years old (middle school age) her family moved to the United States to allow her mother to get a college education. While living in the United States Howard's family would often have to move from place to place, making it difficult to develop any strong friendships while she was growing up. Instead, she turned to creating videos and posting them online as an outlet for her feelings. She would later relocate to Toronto, Ontario.

Online career

Howard first started posting videos in 2009 and in 2010 she began her YouTube channel "LaToya Forever", posting comedy skits and jokes to entertain herself and others. One of her most well-known early videos was titled "Shit Caribbean Moms Say", reflecting on her own mother growing up as well as other mothers from Trinidad. While pregnant with her first child, Samia, she began a video blog, or Vlog of her day creating the channel "LaToya's Life", with "reality show" type content about her and her life. In 2012, she was hired to be the Vibe TV host at the

. In 2015, she introduced the "LaToya Forever App" to give her fans access to her video content. YouTube made "LaToya Forever" their official YouTube Correspondent for the 2015 "YouTube FanFest Live" event that was held on May 2, 2015. In June 2016, she partnered with ''Gone Viral'' TV (GVTV) for a social media seminar. She was one of the featured guests at the 7th annual

VidCon VidCon is an annual convention for fans, creators, executives, and online brands. The event primarily features prominent video stars from across the internet. In October 2020, VidCon Now relaunched as an ongoing, free digital offering. Vetera ...

conference in Anaheim, California. In August 2015, Howard and her team were one of three teams selected for the

Canadian Film Centre The Canadian Film Centre (CFC) is a charitable organization founded by filmmaker Norman Jewison in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, in 1988. Originally launched as film school, today it provides training, development and advancement opportunities for pr ...

and

Canadian Broadcast Corporation The Canadian Broadcasting Corporation (french: Société Radio-Canada), branded as CBC/Radio-Canada, is a Canadian public broadcaster for both radio and television. It is a federal Crown corporation that receives funding from the government. ...

's "Jumping Screens" Comedy workshop, a workshop intended to help the creators make the jump from online to television. The workshop ran from June through November. Howard was one of the featured creators of the 2015

, held from October 13 to 15, 2015, in Toronto Canada. She was named in 2016 VidCon's list of Best and Brightest Black YouTubers. LaToya Howard was invited to the YouTube's Room 301 series by

Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson Dwayne Douglas Johnson (born May 2, 1972), also known by his ring name The Rock, is an American actor and former professional wrestler. Widely regarded as one of the greatest professional wrestlers of all time, he was integral to the developm ...

for a haunted séance spectacular. In October 2016, she launched a new

endless runner Endless runner or infinite runner is a subgenre of platform game in which the player character runs for an infinite amount of time while avoiding obstacles. The player's objective is to reach a high score by surviving for as long as possible. The ...

genre mobile game Save Samia, where users race through the grimy streets of Toronto in order to get her daughter Samia to school on time. Latoya Howard's now four-year-old daughter, Samia Ali, also followed in the footprint of her mother has over 190,000 subscribers on YouTube. She created Rihanna's favourite fenty beauty review, which was shared by the

Rihanna Robyn Rihanna Fenty ( ; born February 20, 1988) is a Barbadian singer, actress, and businesswoman. Born in Saint Michael and raised in Bridgetown, Barbados, Rihanna auditioned for American record producer Evan Rogers who invited her to the ...

on her instagram account and gained attention of media including ''Cosmopolitan'', Huffington Post, ''Elle'', and others. Reality television LaToya Howard appeared on Season 13 of ''

The Real Housewives of Atlanta ''The Real Housewives of Atlanta'' (abbreviated ''RHOA'') is an American reality television series that premiered on Bravo on October 7, 2008. Developed as the third installment of ''The Real Housewives'' franchise, it has aired fourteen season ...

'', as a "Friend of the Housewives". She was initially due to be a full-time housewife for the thirteenth season, but was demoted soon afterwards due to her ex-husband Adam Ali, not wanting to sign off for her kids to be featured on the show.

Writing

Outside of her video work, she produced an e-book titled ''How to become a YouTube Sensation''. She has written an autobiography titled ''LaToya's Life: Uncut Mishaps of a YouTube'' star, published on November 8, 2016.

Bibliography

References

{{Reflist, 30em Black Canadian women Canadian people of Trinidad and Tobago descent Canadian YouTubers Living people People from Scarborough, Toronto 1987 births

Early life

Online career

Writing

Bibliography

See also

References