1 A Cognitive View of Linguistic Variation in Nigerian Undergraduate Descriptive ESL Writing By Anas Sa’idu Muhammad, PhD 1 & Isah Yusuf Chamo, PhD 2 1 Department of Nigerian Languages, Bayero University, Kano asmuhuammad.hau@buk.edu.ng 2 Department of Linguistics & Foreign Languages, Bayero University, Kano iychamo@yahoo.com Abstract English writing among Nigerian students prove to be difficult at various academic levels; including pre-university and university levels. Precisely, poor command in English writing hinders proper academic achievement of most Nigerian undergraduates. The objective of this study is to ascertain the level of variation in English writing of the Nigerian undergraduate in terms of their gender and major ethnic group’s variation. The method applied is purely a descriptive research design using stratified purposive sampling to generate the participants. The findings indicated that the mean scores for the overall scores of the student’s descriptive writing are at an average score. The findings of the study show that the females performed better than their male counterpart when the means difference according to gender was compared. Likewise, in comparing the means difference in accordance with the three major ethnic groups, those originating from the Yorùbá scored the highest means, followed by the Igbo’s, and then the Hausa’s. By its pedagogic implications, the findings are hopeful to contribute and provide insights to Nigerian administrative personals on education and the international education planners concerning ways of enhancing Nigerian undergraduate English writing. Key Words: Descriptive writing, ESL writing, gender variation, ethnic group variation, adapted rubric 1.0 Introduction This study detect that attainment of fluent English writing among non-English natives remain an integral factor in today’s needs as a globalised world. English language has penetrated languages across the world (Coulmas, 2003; Crystal, 1997) and has made way into the languages as well as the cultures of those societies (Javadi-Safa, Vahdany, & Sabet, 2013; Saputra, 2014). In most cases, the prominence of English language originated from colonisation, and keep on existing as a second language (ESL) to some, and to others as a foreign language (EFL). In such a contexts, Jones, Turner, and Street (1999) stresses that the capability to write proficiently is not a naturally acquired talent; it is more often a learned or culturally transmitted procedure through practices which mostly originate from academic settings or other forms of literacy settings. In acquiring writing proficiency, both ESL/EFL learners find it difficult to relate the cognitive requirement needed to be achieved through practice and learning through experience (Grabe & Kaplan, 2014; McLaughlin, 1988).