Q & A | Black, deaf, and Jewish filmmaker Eli Steele is challenging how we view race | The Forward
Eli Steele’s great-grandfather on his father’s side was born into American slavery. His grandmother on his mother’s side escaped the Nazis, then went back and rescued her entire family. His father is Shelby Steele, the famous Black conservative and author of “The Content of our Character,” a book that got him cancelled back in the 1990s.
So when Eli Steele, who is deaf in addition to being Black and Jewish, wanted to become a filmmaker, he was joining a long line of people who refused to accept what society told them about themselves.