The Rice University Neologisms Database

The time period surrounding the fourth Thursday in November in the United States during which students are free from their traditional academic and occupational obligations; the Thanksgiving holiday. Thanksgiving is a long word, and students, being overloaded with work right before the Thanksgiving holiday, want to save as much time as possible by typing few characters when they write to each other. Hence, they create neologisms through clipping. In the week leading up to Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving is one of the most popular topics of conversation among students. Thus, my friend probably assumed that I had Thanksgiving on my mind and would thus understand his neologism. Neologisms like “Thanks” are often coined by Internet Users who are attempting to communicate information quickly. In addition, the clipping of holiday names has an analogical precedent in the holiday “Saint Valentine’s Day.” The original term used to described the holiday celebrate on February 14 of each year was Saint Valentine’s Day. This term became shortened to Valentine’s Day, which then became shortened to Valentine’s. According to its aforementioned usage, “Thanks” refers to the time period that constitutes the Thanksgiving holiday, but it does not designate an exact period of time. It does not refer solely to the 24 hours of the Thursday on which Thanksgiving falls, but to the entire holiday break as a whole, the time during which students are free from their normal academic and work obligations. For most students, the term “thanks” would probably mean Wednesday afternoon through Sunday evening of the week on which Thanksgiving falls. However, not all students would consider this time period as their Thanksgiving break. For example, I have a class on Wednesday evening that I must attend, so my break does not begin on Wednesday afternoon, but rather on Wednesday at 9:00 p.m.