18007
I am following a book called "Teach Yourself Japanese", right now I am on
using adjectives.

In there, there is an example:

> Igirisu no jamu wa totemo oishii desu.

Which I can understand in terms of structure and rules etc..

But in the book, it says that when an adjective is in the negative, "Amari"
must be used. So:

> Igirisu no jamu wa totemo amari oishii desu.

Is there a reason why amari is used? Or can anyone give me some more
information about this word?
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2014-07-28T06:18:09.763
18006
2014-07-28T14:50:04.670
2014-07-28T14:50:04.670
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question
adjectives negation
Use of Amari when an adjective is in the negative
This is a pair of **polarity items**. One appears in positive contexts, the
other in negative:

> イギリスの ジャムは **とても** おいし **いです** 。  
>  イギリスの ジャムは **あまり** おいし **くありません** 。

Every language has words like these. For example, in English:

> I like pie, **too**.  
>  I don't like pie, **either**.

Here, _too_ and _either_ are **polarity items**. In our positive sentence we
use _too_ , and in our negative sentence we use _either_. It doesn't work very
well if we reverse them:

> ×I like pie, **either**.  
>  ×I don't like pie, **too**.

We can see something similar in your Japanese sentences. **とても** means "to a
great degree", similar to English _very_ , and in this meaning it appears in
positive contexts:

> イギリスの ジャムは **とても** おいし **いです** 。  
>  English jam tastes **very** good.

On the other hand, **あまり** means "to a low degree", similar to English _not
very_ , and in this meaning it appears in negative contexts:

> イギリスの ジャムは **あまり** おいし **くありません** 。  
>  English jam does **n't** taste **very** good.

Your book probably didn't mean for you to put them together into one sentence.
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2014-07-28T06:49:29.987
18007
2014-07-28T06:59:19.847
2014-07-28T06:59:19.847
18006
answer
In very simple terms:

"Amari," used with a negative, simply means "quite."

"amari yokunai" = "quite bad."

"amari omoshirokunai" = "quite uninteresting"
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2014-07-28T09:01:38.627
18009
2014-07-28T09:01:38.627
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answer
The simplest meaning vs とても/totemo ("very"), used in many first text books, is
"not very".

This gives us:

> "not very good" for amari yokunai/あまりよくない

and

> "not very interesting" for amari omoshirokunai/あまり面白くない

and even

> "not very bad" for amari warukunai/あまり悪くない

The best way to practice is to buy a text book (which you can probably trust)
or possibly find a website with a few exercises.
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2014-07-28T11:11:49.253
18010
2014-07-28T11:11:49.253
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answer
Things aren't completely +/- here. Variations on

> あまりにもおいしい  
> あまりのおしさ

are both perfectly fine; even common. Or how about

> とてもできない
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2014-07-28T14:13:59.657
18012
2014-07-28T14:13:59.657
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answer