to replace; to take the place of

Can you fill in for me at the meeting?

Will you go to the party instead of me?

I don't think television will take the place of books.

The result of the invention of the steam engine was that human power was replaced by mechanical power.

I bet you'd never heard of a Stroh violin before Tom Waits dug it back up! Anyway, it used a large metal horn as its resonator instead of a wooden box so it could be picked up better by recording equipment before the late 1920s.