Today’s Words That Work: Fungible

Something that’s fungible (FUN-juh-bul) — from the Latin for “to perform the office of” — is exchangeable, in whole or in part, for something of like nature or kind.

Example (as used by Frank Bruni in The New York Times): “Her success so far suggests the way celebrity begets more celebrity and fame is fungible, in a matter that allows, say, a figure skater to convert Olympic gold into a Food Network show. ‘What Would Brian Boitano Make?’ just entered its second season.”