I know what pakled is talking about, though I'll admit my anime watching has been limited. Hold frames are very popular in all forms of animation, because they allow a company to save money. One of the most expensive scenes to film in traditonal animation like Disney is underwater scenes where the hair has to constantly move for all 24 frames. Anime seems to go a step further and uses those hold frames for quite a bit longer to the point where it's very noticeable. People just don't stay perfectly still like that. But it takes a large budget to be able to create the illusion of life per frame, and so they tend to cut costs by using still frames. Even so, the medium is still animation as there is motion.