Revising Pre‐Service Teacher Education for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion: Multicultural Curriculum Challenges and Prospects in South Africa

ABSTRACT This study undertakes a systematic literature review to examine the challenges and opportunities of revising pre‐service teacher education in South Africa to foreground diversity, equity, and inclusion. Guided by social justice pedagogies, the review critically interrogates the multicultural curriculum within initial teacher education programmes. While post‐apartheid reforms created the conditions for change, persistent systemic inequalities continue to shape educational experiences and outcomes, which calls for a thorough reconceptualisation of how teachers are prepared for increasingly diverse classrooms. Drawing on empirical and conceptual literature published between 2004 and 2024, the review follows a transparent search and screening process, guided by recognised systematic review procedures. It interrogates dominant curricula and their underlying frameworks and identifies pedagogical, ideological, and institutional barriers that hinder the meaningful integration of multicultural and decolonial perspectives. Key challenges include the superficial treatment of diversity, tokenistic curricular additions, and inadequate provision for the sustained professional development of teacher educators in social justice praxis. At the same time, the review highlights concrete possibilities for transformation, including the development of critical consciousness and reflexivity among pre‐service teachers, the implementation of culturally sustaining pedagogies that affirm learner identities, and the creation of school‐university partnerships that take fair and inclusive practice as a central focus. By synthesising a diverse body of scholarship, the study offers a coherent account of pathways for reconceptualising pre‐service teacher education so that curricula move beyond symbolic claims of multiculturalism towards social justice as a lived commitment. The findings signal the need for immediate policy and programme reconfiguration to equip newly qualified teachers with the knowledge, skills, and dispositions required to create genuinely inclusive and equitable learning spaces for all learners in South Africa.