I’m Bridget Ritz. My work bridges insights from the American philosophical tradition of pragmatism with critical realism, a philosophy of science and social science, and applies these to questions in cultural sociology and the sociology of religion.

Books

Occulture: The New Face of American Spirituality, with Christian Smith and Matthew Coetzee, Forthcoming with Oxford University Press.

American culture has become profoundly re-enchanted through movements, media, beliefs, and practices of “occulture,” with growing popular interests in magic, spirituality, alternative healing practices, neopaganism, psychic powers, eastern religions, the New Age, sacred nature, ghosts, esoterica, monsters, and more. This cultural transformation has huge implications for traditional religion, secularism, and American society, as deep-culture beliefs are morphing to align with both ancient and novel religious and occultic belief systems. Yet re-enchantment remains invisible to most observers, because its organizations and practices do not fit the standard assumptions, categories, and measures of religion. This book draws on multiple sources of data to provide the
first, ground-breaking, big-picture survey of American re-enchantment—its extent, character, and larger meaning.

Religious Parenting: Transmitting Faith and Values in Contemporary America, with Christian Smith and Michael Rotolo, Princeton University Press, 2020.

How do American parents pass their religion on to their children? At a time of overall decline of traditional religion and an increased interest in personal “spirituality,” Religious Parenting investigates the ways that parents transmit religious beliefs, values, and practices to their kids. We know that parents are the most important influence on their children’s religious lives, yet parents have been virtually ignored in previous work on religious socialization. This book explores American parents’ strategies, experiences, beliefs, and anxieties regarding religious transmission through hundreds of in-depth interviews that span religious traditions, social classes, and family types all around the country.

Peer-Reviewed Articles

Dewey’s Peircean Aesthetics: An Exegesis and Its Upshot for Sociology

Journal of Classical Sociology

Beauty in Experiment: A Qualitative Analysis of Aesthetic Experiences in Scientific Practice, with Milena Ivanova, Marcela Duque, and Brandon Vaidyanathan

Studies in History and Philosophy of Science

Evoking, Grounding, and Defining: How Contemporary Scientists Connect Religion, Spirituality, and Aesthetics, with Di Di and Brandon Vaidyanathan

Religions

Social Mechanisms: Bridging Critical Realist and Pragmatist Approaches

Journal of Critical Realism

Continuities Between Peircean Realism and Critical Realism: On Causation, Ontology, and Truth

Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour

Peircean Realism: A Primer

Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour

Discordant Benevolence: How and Why People Help Others in the Face of Conflicting Values, with Sarah K. Cowan, Tricia C. Bruce, Brea Perry, Stuart Perrett, and Elizabeth M. Anderson

Science Advances

Comparing Abduction and Retroduction in Peircean Pragmatism and Critical Realism

Journal of Critical Realism

Popular writing

“Aha = Wow”

Aeon, January 7, 2025.