Becky with the good hair (n.)

When Beyonce dropped her sixth album, “Lemonade,’’ in April, one lyric from her breakup anthem “Sorry’’ made us prick up our ears: “He better call Becky with the good hair.’’ We presumed “he’’ had to be rapper-entrepreneur Jay-Z, the singer’s hubby. But who was this Becky with the good hair? Social media sleuths first pointed at fashion designer Rachel Roy who, rumors suggested, may have gotten too cozy with Jay-Z. Of course, since the Internet is messy like that, some thought the home-wrecking Becky was celebrity chef Rachael Ray, which briefly made her the target for the fierce enmity of the BeyHive, Beyonce’s most hard-core fans.

Whether Becky referred to someone specific or served as an umbrella term for several women, no one was sure, and Beyonce certainly wasn’t telling. This much, however, people believed: Becky is white. For years, “Becky’’ has been black cultural shorthand for a white woman, prefaced on the idea that Becky is literally the whitest white woman name ever. On the Fox melodrama “Empire,’’ the Becky concept was even turned inside out when a black record company receptionist named Becky Williams, played by Gabourey Sidibe, is asked, “What type of a black girl named Becky?’’ She responds, “Oh, my mom’s white.’’ (On another note, Beyonce’s “good hair’’ reference evokes a painful issue for black women in a society where white standards of beauty, exemplified by straight hair, are considered more desirable and attractive.)

Perhaps, inevitably, the mystery around Beyonce’s new song soon became a hilarious hashtag for all things Becky, most notably as a way to razz Abigail Fisher, a white woman who sued the University of Texas at Austin after she was denied admission. When the Supreme Court ruled in June against Fisher’s attempt to have the school’s affirmative action policy overturned, she was quickly immortalized on Twitter with a new name: #BeckyWithTheBadGrades.

­— RENEE GRAHAM

Renee Graham can be reached at renee.graham@globe.com.