Cantonese and Guangxi people like to address people with the word "A" before their names. One is as a general term, such as: grandma (general term for older women), grandpa (general term for older men), sister (general term for younger women) and brother (general term for younger men). There is also a nickname, that is, the last word of the scientific name and the word "A", which is used to express a special feeling for each other, such as A Guang, A Jian and Alan.

Lexically, the word "A" is a function word with no practical meaning, and its part of speech is the same as the word "Lao" before the words such as tiger, mouse and procuress. But it has a function, which is to form a disyllabic word with the Chinese characters behind it, which is convenient for pronunciation. Phonetically, disyllabic words are more catchy than monosyllabic words.