Soft Power

This chapter presents a history of polyurethane foams in the United States. It traces their provenance from World War II US military intelligence reports that recommended the postwar transfer of plastic foams from Germany to their domestic applications in the postwar United States. During this period, the commercial uses of polyurethane foams mushroomed, enveloping postwar bodies in everyday encounters with a variety of consumer goods. The chapter focuses on how gender and race shaped the presentation and marketing of polyurethane foam’s soft haptic properties in the context of Cold War soft power politics. It explores how key actors, including chemical company advertising staff, journalists, and industrial designers, harnessed foam’s soft materiality for its postwar domestic promotion and applications, often by presenting a carefully constructed ideal of white American womanhood and heteronormativity.