Dear M,
I am sure most career bartenders would not call those drinks "cocktails" but I
do know that many American "civilians" do refer to many 'mixed drinks' as
"cocktails" (as in, "lets meet for cocktails at 7pm")
As to the definition of the cocktail you can take the original one from 1806
that defined the Cocktail as a specific family of drinks much like a Collins
or a Sour but thats basically irrelavant too these days... much quoted but
times change.
In my trainings i tend to give a short hand definition of a Cocktail of a
drink consisting of a minimum of 3 (including ice)that requires skilled
preparation or prior training to make correctly.
Not perfect by any means but workable in this day and age... yes there are
exceptions to this but its workable for sure.
Hope this helps and intersted in any other more accurate yet still workable
defintions from the group.
cheers
aw