I'm right now studying Persian Literature in University of Tehran. I'm I want to apply for Islamic/Near Eastern Studies in USA/UK universities. I know Persian/Arabic/German and English and I have reasonable knowledge on Middle Eastern History and Islamic Studies.
I'm applying to pursue my studies in Islamic Studies/Near Eastern/Studies this year. I want to know if anybody guides me for maximizing my chance to get admission and scholarship? How much is my chance to get scholarship? Can anybody tell me which materials are important in my application? I read for example Michigan and UC Berkeley don't want GRE, but Yale says GRE is very important. Can anybody tell me which universities have good programs?
I know these:
UC Berkeley
Harvard
UCLA
Columbia
Princeton
Chicago
Michigan
NYU
in UK:
University of London
Oxford
I see some universities such as Stanford don't have a department on near Eastern Studies but they have a program of Islamic Studies. Is it possible to study in these programs? I'm sorry that my question is very general, but I'm new to this whole issue.