Exogenic forces

● External forces or exogenic forces are the forces that draw their power from
the earth’s exterior.
● The action of exogenic forces results in wearing down and hence they are
considered ‘land-wearing forces’.
● Exogenetic processes directly result from stress-induced in earth materials
due to various forces that come into existence because of the sun’s heat,
temperature and precipitation.

● All the exogenic geomorphic processes are covered under a general term,
denudation.
● The word ‘denude’ means to strip off or to uncover.
● Weathering, mass wasting/movements, erosion, and transportation are
included in denudation.
● Denudation mainly depends on rock type and its structure that includes
folds, faults, orientation and inclination of beds, presence or absence of
joints, bedding planes, hardness or softness of constituent minerals, chemical
susceptibility of mineral constituents; permeability, or impermeability, etc.

Denudation:- 4 Phases
Weathering
Erosion
Transportation
Deposition
Weathering

● Weathering is the disintegration of rocks, soil, and minerals under the

influence of physical (heat, pressure) and chemical (leaching, oxidation and
reduction, hydration) agents.
● As very little or no motion of materials takes place in weathering. It is an In-
situ breakdown of rock material.
● The weathered material is carried farther away by erosion.
● There are three major groups of weathering processes:
Physical or mechanical
chemical
Biological

Mass Wasting
● Mass wasting, also known as ‘slope movement or mass movement’, is the
geomorphic process by which soil, sand, regolith, and rock move downslope
typically as a mass, largely under the force of gravity, but frequently
affected by water and water content as in submarine environments and
mudflows.

Landslide
● A landslide is the movement of rock, debris or earth down a slope. They
result from the failure of the materials which make up the hill slope and are
driven by the force of gravity. Landslides are known also as landslips,
slumps or slope failures.

Erosion
● Erosion is the act in which the earth is worn away, often by water, wind, or
ice. It is an ex-situ process where an external agent is involved. The
fragments break because of external impact i.e. kinetic energy. Unlike
weathering where only gravity is involved.
● The rocks are broken at one place and the broken particles are carried by the
agents to far distances and are deposited.
● It is the most destructive process shaping tertiary reliefs.
 ● There are broadly five agents which cause erosion and carve distinct
landforms: running surface water, wind, glaciers, waves and karst.

Deposition
● Erosion is the acquisition and transportation of rock debris by geomorphic
agents like running water, the wind, waves etc.
● Though weathering aids erosion, it is not a pre-condition for erosion to take
place. (i.e., erosion can take place in unweathered conditions also)
● The deposition is a consequence of erosion. The erosional agents lose their
velocity and energy on gentle slopes and materials carried by them start to
settle themselves.
● The deposition is not the work of any agents. It is just the end result of
erosion.