Understanding galaxies and their evolution over time is critical for interpreting the stellar history and chemical enrichment of the Universe.  Galaxies that lie at different distances help us fill in different pieces of the puzzle — from large statistical samples of coarsely-resolved systems to our own Milky Way, which gives us a unique, up-close picture of galaxy structure and fundamental stellar physics.  I will describe the Milky Way and Local Group in the context of  galactic studies and highlight recent work that explores how stars and gas shape the evolution of galaxies on a wide variety of scales.  With numerous new surveys on the horizon, including Gaia and the next generation of SDSS, these topics promise to be exciting avenues of research for many years to come.