How to do a right-click on Nautilus if it is on list view?

If you have a file/folder selected in list view, unselect it first by pressing Ctrl+Space. Then press Shift+F10 to open the context menu (right-click menu).

You can use the Menu Key to emulate right click, which is usually on the right side between alt and ctrl. However, for it to work, you need to make sure none of the items are selected (like /etc in the screenshot above). To get rid of the selection, try switching to a different location, for example, Trash or Recent, and then back to where you need to be.