Does "ritual" in the sentence below mean "aspect" and "phase"?

Sentence:
While for Freud the dream-work operated on an individual idiosyncratic basis, artist Susan Hiller, whose work is productively critical of the Freudian legacy, explores the collective ritual of this process which testifies to the more social aspect of the phenomenon as a source of creative inspiration.

Question

Does "ritual" in the sentence below mean "aspect" and "phase"?

Sentence:
While for Freud the dream-work operated on an individual idiosyncratic basis, artist Susan Hiller, whose work is productively critical of the Freudian legacy, explores the collective ritual of this process which testifies to the more social aspect of the phenomenon as a source of creative inspiration.

Answer

Well, yes and no.

I believe the writer means "ritual" in a literal sense, but the writer is considering the aspect of collective ritual.

The idea is that Freud thought about how dream-work affected people as individuals, but Susan Hiller thinks about how the "ritual" of dream-work affects groups of people, rather than just individuals.

So, ritual means ritual, but your question makes sense, because the sentence talks about viewing the ritual from different aspects.

Of course, it is always possible that I am wrong, haha!
Good luck!